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The  Contribution  of  Connecticut 


TO  THE 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania 


BY 


PAULINE  WOLCOTT  SPENCER 


THESIS 

Presented  to  the  Faculty  of  the  Graduate  School  of 

THE  University  of  Pennsylvania  in  Partial 

Fulfilment  of  the  Requirements 

for  the  degree  of  Doctor 

OF  Philosophy 


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PRESS  OF 

THE  NEW  ERA  PRINTING  COMPANY 

LANCASTER,  PA. 

I9IS 


The  Contribution  of  Connecticut 


TO  THE 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania 


BY 

PAULINE  WOLCOTT  SPENCER 


THESIS 

Presented  to  the  Faculty  of  the  Graduate  School  of 

THE  University  of  Pennsylvania  in  Partial 

Fulfilment  of  the  Requirements 

for  the  degree  of  doctor 

OF  Philosophy 


'  »   ) 


»  »  »  ,    ^   ■> 


'  >    », .      . , 


PRESS  OF 

THE  NEW  ERA  PRINTING  COMPANY 

LANCASTER,  PA. 

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TABLE  OF  CONTENTS 

Page 

Introduction i 

Chapter    I.     The  Educational  Background 6 

Chapter    II.     The  Connecticut  Intrusion 20 

Chapter  III.     The  Educational  Inheritance  of  the  Wyoming 

Settlers.     Education  in  Connecticut  to  the 
Close  of  the  Eighteenth  Century 33 

Chapter    IV.     Education  in  Wyoming 43 

Appendix 66 

Bibliography. 68 


336264 


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*»» 


»•  J         •    >  ♦  » 


THE  CONTRIBUTION  OF  CONNECTICUT  TO. 

THE  COMMON  SCHOOL  SYSTEM  OF 

PENNSYLVANIA 


INTRODUCTION 

Of  all  the  colonies  in  America,  Pennsylvania  was  the  most 
mixed  in  population,  religion  and  language.  Among  the  nation- 
alities represented  were  Dutch,  Swedes,  English,  Germans, 
Scotch-Irish,  Welsh,  Swiss  and  a  few  French.  In  religion  there 
were  Quakers,  Presbyterians,  Episcopalians,  Catholics,  Baptists, 
Lutherans,  Reformed  and  the  various  other  German  sects 
whose  number  it  is  difficult  to  estimate.  With  all  these  groups 
the  working  out  of  a  common  educational  practice  was  far  more 
difficult  and  a  slower  process  than  among  the  homogeneous 
settlers  in  the  New  England  states.  Religious  and  consequent 
political  antagonisms  appear  as  a  prominent  factor  in  the  final 
educational  adjustment  which  was  wrought  out  in  our  Common- 
wealth by  the  adoption  in  1834-5  of  a  state  system  of  common 
schools. 

The  larger  and  dominant  groups  in  this  educational  develop- 
ment were  the  English,  including  Quakers  and  Episcopalians, 
the  Germans  of  the  various  sects  and  the  Scotch- Irish.  The 
part  played  by  these  has  been  studied  and  recorded  more  or 
less  fully;  and  the  debt  of  Pennsylvania  to  them  and  to  their 
zeal  for  education  in  the  beginning  of  our  history  has  been 
acknowledged.  A  potent  educational  force,  limited  however 
to  a  small  area,  and  exercised  under  conditions  which  were  most 
unfavorable,  appears  in  the  group  of  New  Englanders,  largely 
people  of  Connecticut,  in  what  is  known  as  the  Wyoming  region 
in  the  northeastern  part  of  the  State  about  the  middle  of  the 
eighteenth  century.  The  steps  by  which  in  planning  and 
finally  carrying  out  their  design  of  planting  a  colony  in  this 
region,  they  also  attempted  to  introduce  the  educational  ideals 


>   » 


2  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

which  they  had  brought  from  the  home  colony  sixty  years 
before  the  well-entrenched  groups  were  ready  to  adopt  a  common 
school  system,  are  worthy  of  a  more  systematic  study  than  has 
as  yet  been  made.  Such  a  study  should  be  a  contribution  to  the 
educational  history  of  our  State  not  without  interest,  especially 
in  the  light  which  it  can  shed  upon  the  better  known  activities 
of  the  previously  mentioned  groups. 

The  history  of  the  Wyoming  invasion,  the  resulting  conflict 
and  the  tragedies  which  it  entailed  have  been  repeatedly  re- 
corded, both  by  the  earlier  historians.  Chapman,  Miner  and 
others  who  drew  from  local  sources  and  records,  and  from  the 
personal  narratives  of  actors  in  the  occurrences  described ;  and 
more  recently  by  Fisher,  in  ''The  Making  of  Pennsylvania," 
Chapter  X,  which  contains  a  brief  and  spirited  account  of  the 
New  England  enterprise  from  the  time  of  the  attempt  at  the 
establishment  of  the  charter  claim  of  Connecticut  to  the  northern 
portion  of  Pennsylvania  down  to  the  final  legal  adjustment  by 
acts  of  the  legislature  of  our  State  early  in  the  nineteenth  century. 
Still  more  recently  Mr.  Harvey  has  issued  two  volumes  of  his 
*' History  of  Wilkes-Barre"  which  is  a  scholarly  and  exhaustive 
study  of  the  history  of  the  city  which  "up  to  about  the  year 
1800,"  as  Mr.  Harvey  says,  "  is  really  in  a  wide  sense  the  history 
of  the  Wyoming  Valley."  The  second  volume  brings  the  nar- 
rative down  to  the  year  1780;  a  third  volume  is  promised  later. 
'  The  educational  ideals  of  the  New  Englanders  and  the  first 
steps  by  which  they  planned  to  execute  them  in  the  pioneer 
community  which  they  proposed  to  build  up  are  set  forth  in  the 
records  of  the  Susquehanna  Company,  organized  in  Connecticut 
in  1753.  The  Wyoming  settlers,  on  their  arrival  in  Pennsyl- 
vania, immediately  undertook  the  execution  of  the  proposed 
plans.  The  records  of  the  town  meetings  held  by  the  people 
of  that  region  from  the  time  of  their  settlement  there,  and  during 
the  years  in  which  the  portion  of  the  State  claimed  by  Connecti- 
cut was  a  town  and  later  a  county  of  the  latter  State,  were  kept 
in  the  ''Westmoreland  Records."  These  manuscripts,  or  a 
portion  of  them,  were  consulted  and  quoted  by  Miner  in  his 
history.  They  have  since  in  large  part  disappeared;  only 
a  fragment  of  them  remains,  now  in  the  possession  of  the  Wyom- 
ing Historical  and   Geological  Society  at  Wilkes-Barre.     For 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  3 

forty  years  from  the  time  of  the  coming  of  the  New  Englanders 
until  the  final  adjustment  of  the  difficulties  and  the  land  claims 
growing  out  of  these,  the  region  was  involved  in  a  series  of 
tragedies,  including  "border"  warfare,  Indian  massacres  and 
civil  disorders,  leading  to  questions  of  ownership  and  conflicts 
of  authority,  all  of  which  were  unfavorable  both  to  the  making 
and  the  preservation  of  records.  Beside  the  Westmoreland 
Records,  which,  as  above  mentioned,  have  almost  entirely  dis- 
appeared, the  earliest  town  records  of  Wilkes-Barre  and  other 
public  and  private  documents  were  lost  or  destroyed  in  the  dis- 
asters of  1778  and  during  the  later  difficulties  between  the  New 
England  settlers  and  the  people  of  Pennsylvania.^  Therefore 
the  attempt  to  study  any  educational  developments  which  may 
have  occurred  in  those  times  of  confusion  and  tumult  meets  at 
the  outset  the  discouragement  of  finding  few  records.  During 
the  period  intervening  between  the  Trenton  Decree  and  the 
adoption  by  the  State  of  the  common  school  system,  there  being 
no  authority  in  education,  such  matters  were  dealt  with  at  the 
option  of  local  communities;  and  it  is  probable  that  in  many 
cases  records  were  not  kept  by  the  school  committees  representing 
the  various  townships.  County  and  local  historians  have  re- 
covered and  preserved  some  township  data  and  personal  reminis- 
cences of  school  intentions  and  proceedings.  The  Report  of 
the  Superintendent  of  Public  Instruction  in  Pennsylvania  for 
1877  contains  valuable  historical  chapters  compiled  by  the  co- 
operation of  county  and  city  superintendents,  in  response  to  the 
request  of  the  State  Superintendent.  Within  recent  years  an 
attempt  has  been  made  to  collect  all  possible  items  of  local 
record  or  reminiscence  in  all  lines,  and  these  have  been  published 
in  the  Wyoming  Historical  Record  at  Wilkes-Barre,  under  the 
editorship  of  the  late  Dr.  F.  C.  Johnson,  and  in  the  "Proceedings 
and  Collections  of  the  Wyoming  Historical  and  Geological 
Society"  in  the  same  city.  There  is  but  a  slender  amount  of 
material  with  which  to  make  a  historical  study;  yet  in  this  case 
such  details  can  be  fortified  by  the  test  of  inference,  by  reference 
to  contemporary  newspapers  and  by  a  comparison  of  the  accounts 
which  remain  with  like  records  of  the  Connecticut  school  author- 
ities of  the  time.     Wickersham  in  his  "History  of  Education 

^  Harvey:  Op.  cit.,  Vol.  I,  p.  25. 


4  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

in  Pennsylvania"  says  in  reference  to  the  system  of  free  public 
schools  brought  by  the  Connecticut  settlers  into  the  Wyoming 
Valley:  "Pennsylvania  as  a  Province  had  nothing  to  do  with 
establishing  them,  in  principle  they  were  an  advance  upon  the 
schools  then  existing  in  Connecticut;  and  in  most  respects  were 
similar  in  design  and  management  to  the  public  schools  of  the 
present  day."^  Fisher  says:  "One  characteristic  those  heroes 
succeeded  in  impressing  on  the  land.  That  was  the  New  Eng- 
land school  system.  One  of  their  first  acts,  amid  their  poverty 
and  misfortunes,  was  to  make  provision  for  public  schools.  All 
through  their  ancient  records  we  find  entries  to  maintain  this 
institution,  without  which  the  New  Englander  is  not  of  New 
England.  When  in  the  second  quarter  of  the  present  century, 
the  State  adopted  that  system,  it  was  simply  extending  to  the 
whole  commonwealth  what  had  been  in  force  in  the  Valley  for 
nearly  a  hundred  years.  "^ 

It  is  not  without  significance  that  in  the  great  educational 
movements  in  our  State  many  leaders  have  been  men  of  New 
England  birth.  The  debt  of  Pennsylvania  to  such  New  Eng- 
landers  as  Benjamin  Franklin,  Timothy  Pickering,  Thaddeus 
Stevens,  Samuel  Breck,  Walter  Johnson,  John  S.  Hart  and  others 
has  been  acknowledged.  It  remains  to  gather  up  from  all  avail- 
able sources  the  facts  concerning  the  contribution  which  the 
sturdy  group  of  Connecticut  pioneers  made  to  the  educational 
life  of  our  great  State  in  the  nearly  three  quarters  of  a  century 
which  intervened  between  their  coming  and  the  adoption  by  the 
State  of  the  common  school  system  in  1834-45. 

The  bibliography  contains  a  classified  list  of  the  works  and 
sources  from  which  material  has  been  drawn,  or  to  which  refer- 
ence has  been  made.  The  arrangement  in  each  case  is  alpha- 
betical, except  in  the  first  and  last  classes,  where  it  seemed 
desirable  to  follow  the  chronological  order  of  publication.  No 
marginal  reference  is  used  in  the  case  of  citations  from  newspapers 
where  the  date  of  publication  is  stated  in  the  text.  In  legal 
citations  the  usual  form  of  reference  for  such  has  been  followed. 
The  Appendix  contains  matter  which,  while  not  bearing  directly 
on  the  argument,  seemed  of  too  great  incidental  interest  to  be 
omitted. 

1  Op.  cit.,  p.  74. 

2  0p.  cit.,  p.  316. 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  5 

The  writer  desires  to  acknowledge  obligation  to  those  who 
have  assisted  in  or  contributed  to  the  work:  to  the  Reverend 
Dr.  Horace  E.  Hayden,  Secretary  of  the  Wyoming  Historical 
and  Geological  Society  of  Wilkes-Barre,  Pennsylvania,  for  his 
many  courtesies  in  affording  opportunity  for  the  use  of  the 
valuable  collections  in  the  possession  of  the  Society,  and  for 
numerous  helpful  suggestions;  to  Mr.  Oscar  J.  Harvey  of  Wilkes- 
Barre,  not  only  for  the  light  thrown  on  the  study  of  the  Wyoming 
region  by  his  History  of  Wilkes-Barre,  but  also  for  the  privilege 
of  a  personal  interview  which  illuminated  the  subject  and  pointed 
out  its  limitations;  to  Miss  Elizabeth  B.  Gendell,  Librarian  of 
the  Philadelphia  Normal  School,  for  a  thorough  search  through 
periodical  literature  for  material  bearing  on  the  theme;  and  to 
the  Historical  Society  of  Pennsylvania  for  many  privileges  and 
courtesies  afforded  during  the  prosecution  of  the  work. 

Special  and  grateful  acknowledgment  is  extended  to  Dean 
Frank  P.  Graves  of  the  School  of  Education  of  the  University 
of  Pennsylvania,  for  his  interest  in  the  work  and  for  suggestions 
and  corrections  in  the  manuscript;  and  finally,  but  by  no  means 
least  of  all  to  Dr.  A.  Duncan  Yocum,  Chairman  of  the  Depart- 
ment of  Education  of  the  University  of  Pennsylvania,  under 
whose  sympathetic  supervision,  constant  encouragement  and 
numerous  wise  and  practical  suggestions  the  work  was  begun 
and  has  been  carried  to  completion. 

Pauline  Wolcott  Spencer. 
University  of  Pennsylvania, 
May  20,  1915. 


CHAPTER  I 

THE  EDUCATIONAL  BACKGROUND 

A  Brief  Survey  of  the  Elementary  Education  Conducted  by  the 
Leading  Nationalities  and  Religious  Sects  in  Pennsylvania 

The  democracy  of  America  is  sustained  by  the  public  school 
supported  by  the  State,  and  free  to  all.  The  public  school  pro- 
viding a  universal  education  had  its  origin  in  the  Reformation. 
Its  basis  was  the  idea  that  each  individual  must  be  capable  of 
reading  the  Scriptures,  and  of  making  a  rational  application  of 
religious  doctrine  to  his  own  eternal  welfare.^  The  great  educa- 
tional leaders  in  the  movement  were  Luther,  Calvin  and  Knox. 
The  influence  of  Luther  was  supreme  in  Germany,  while  that  of 
Calvin  was  stronger  in  the  Protestant  parts  of  France  and 
Switzerland,  in  Holland  and  England .^  Knox's  field  of  course 
was  Scotland.  The  Puritans  in  England  and  in  America  were 
under  Calvin's  sway.  Luther  announced  in  the  famous  "Ad- 
dress to  the  Mayors  and  Councilmen  of  all  the  German  Cities'* 
in  1524  that  "for  the  maintenance  of  civil  order  schools  are 
necessary,  and  the  civil  authorities  are  under  obligation  to  com- 
pel the  people  to  send  their  children  to  school."^  The  doctrines 
of  Calvin  contained  a  similar  implication.  It  was  Protestantism, 
the  desire  for  religious  freedom,  that  brought  the  Pilgrims  and 
Puritans  to  Massachusetts  and  the  Quakers  to  Pennsylvania. 
It  was  inevitable,  therefore,  that  in  these  and  other  states  so 
colonized,  this  idea  of  universal  popular  education  supported 
by  the  state  should  find  early  expression. 

Since  in  Pennsylvania  there  were  so  many  diverse  factors 
and  warring  elements  engaged  in  working  out  the  political  and 
educational  policies  of  the  future,  the  educational  ideas  and 
activities  of  the  leading  groups  should  be  briefly  summed  up. 
The  Dutch,  although  the  first  comers  to  Penn's  future  province, 

*  Monroe:  Text  Book  in  the  History  of  Education,  p.  407. 

2  Fiske:  Dutch  and  Quaker  Colonies  in  America,  Vol.  I.,  p.  33. 

'  Painter:  Luther  on  Education,  p.  65. 

6 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  7 

were  numerically  unimportant ;  nevertheless  they  represented  the 
nation  which  earliest  of  all  the  European  states  is  held  to  have 
made  literacy  common  to  all,  even  the  peasants,  and  to  have 
established  a  system  of  public  schools.  Guicciardini,  the  Flor- 
entine historian,  is  said  to  have  stated  that  before  1540  the 
peasants  in  Holland  could  commonly  read  and  write  their  own 
language,  and  that  free  schools,  supported  by  public  taxes,  were 
the  subject  of  legislation  at  various  times  during  the  sixteenth 
century.^  From  an  earlier  date  the  Dutch  were  interested  in  the 
public  control  and  support  of  education,  and  a  number  of  cities 
maintained  schools.^  Salaries  of  the  schoolmasters  were  some- 
times paid  from  the  town  treasury,  sometimes  from  church 
funds  sequestered  from  the  church  orders  at  the  Reformation.^ 
Owing  to  the  many  religious  differences  and  to  the  attempt  on 
the  part  of  the  Calvinists  to  dominate  the  state,  religious  and 
secular  authorities  worked  against  each  other .^  By  the  middle 
of  the  seventeenth  century  throughout  the  country,  both  cities 
and  rural  districts  were  provided  with  schools  of  various  grades, 
controlled  and  often  supported  by  the  public  secular  author- 
ities.^ The  children  of  the  poor  were  taught  gratuitously.^ 
Girls  appear  to  have  been  admitted  to  the  elementary  schools 
with  the  boys,  although  excluded  from  the  privileges  of  higher 
education.'^ 

The  view  has  been  frequently  advanced  that  Holland  furnished 
to  both  Calvinistic  New  England  and  Quaker  Pennsylvania  the 
ideal  of  the  public  school.  Wickersham  says:  "It  was  during 
their  twelve  years'  sojourn  in  Holland  that  the  Pilgrim  Fathers 
obtained  the  germs  of  that  system  of  education  which  has  made 
New  England  so  famous  in  our  educational  history;  and  it  was 
in  Holland,  too,  almost  certainly,  that  William  Penn  learned 
those  broad  principles  of  educational  policy  that  are  embodied  in 
the  first  Frame  he  constructed  for  the  government  of  his  Province, 

*Fiske:  Op.  cit.,  Vol.  I,  p.  i8.  See  also  Kilpatrick:  The  Dutch  Schools 
of  New  Netherland  and  Colonial  New  York. 

2  Kilpatrick:  Op.  cit.,  p.  20. 

3  Ibid.,  p.  27. 

*  Ibid.,  pp.  21,  24. 
^  Ibid.,  p.  21. 
^  Ibid.,  pp.  20,  21,  24. 
'  Ibid.,  p.  30. 


/ 
8  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

and  that  he  endeavored  to  have  incorporated  in  laws  for  the 
benefit  of  the  people."^  Eggleston  traces  the  Dutch  law  of  the 
Synod  of  Dort  in  1618  to  the  scheme  proposed  fifty  years  earlier 
by  John  Knox  in  his  "Book  of  Discipline. "^  But  fifty  years 
prior  to  that  date  (161 8)  the  reformers  in  Holland  had  begun  to 
care  for  schools  and  schoolmasters.^  Fiske  holds  that  not  the 
example  of  Holland,  but  fundamentally  the  principles  of  Cal- 
vinism furnished  the  motive  power  which  led  to  the  movement  in 
behalf  of  universal  and  compulsory  education  in  the  sixteenth 
and  seventeenth  centuries  in  the  Protestant  portions  of  Europe.'* 

The  Swedes  were  the  next  comers  to  Pennsylvania.  At  home 
as  in  other  Protestant  countries,  educational  activities  were 
carried  on  by  the  co-operation  of  Church  and  State  authorities. 
The  Swedish  government  was  not  neglectful  of  the  educational 
interests  of  the  colony  on  the  Delaware.^  Neither  Dutch  nor 
Swedes,  however,  were  important  factors  in  the  educational  de- 
velopment of  Pennsylvania,  since  numerically  they  were  not 
strong  and  were  soon  overshadowed  by  the  more  numerous  and 
powerful  groups. 

With  the  grant  of  the  territory  to  Penn  and  the  establish- 
ment on  Pennsylvania  soil  of  the  Quaker  province,  Penn  gave  im- 
mediate attention  to  the  question  of  education.  In  the  well- 
known  Preface  to  the  Frame  of  Government  written  in  England  in 
1682  he  says:  "That  therefore  which  makes  a  good  constitution 
must  keep  it,  namely,  men  of  wisdom  and  virtue,  qualities  that 
because  they  descend  not  with  worldly  inheritance  must  be 
carefully  propagated  by  a  virtuous  education  of  youth."®  This 
Frame  contained  the  following  educational  provision:  "Twelfth, 
that  the  Governor  and  Provincial  Council  shall  erect  and  order 
all  public  schools,  and  encourage  and  reward  the  authors  of 
useful  sciences  and  laudable  inventions  in  the  said  Province."^ 

*  Wickersham:  History  of  Education  in  Pennsylvania,  p.  4. 

2  Eggleston:  Transit  of  Civilization,  p.  232.  Cf.  Kilpatrick:  op.  cit., 
p.  20. 

'  Ibid.,  p.  19. 

*  Fiske:  Op.  cit..  Vol.  I,  p.  33. 
*^  Wickersham :  Op.  cit.,  p.  7. 

*  Charter  to  William  Penn  and  Laws  of  the  Province  of   Pennsylvania, 

P-93. 

'  Ibid.,  p.  95. 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  9 

A  Committee  of  Manners,  Education  and  Arts  was  to  be  appoint- 
ed, that  improper  conduct  might  be  suppressed  and  the  youth 
trained  in  virtue  and  useful  knowledge  and  arts.^  Puritan  and 
Quaker  alike  looked  upon  the  school  as  a  vital  element  in  the 
State.  In  the  "Great  Law"  adopted  by  the  first  Assembly 
held  at  Chester  after  Penn's  arrival  the  following  provision  was 
included:  "That  the  laws  of  this  Province  from  time  to  time 
shall  be  published  and  printed,  that  every  person  may  have  the 
knowledge  thereof ;  and  they  shall  be  one  of  the  books  taught  in 
the  schools  of  the  Province  and  Territories  thereof.^  A  sub- 
sequent addition  was  made  in  a  later  Frame  adopted  the  follow- 
ing year,  which  made  compulsory  upon  parents  and  guardians 
the  instruction  of  children  in  letters  and  industrial  skill,  and 
such  instruction  was  to  be  universal,  alike  for  rich  and  poor.^ 
Ten  years  later  under  Governor  Fletcher  this  law  was  modified 
and  practically  nullified  by  requiring  such  instruction  to  be 
given  only  by  those  having  sufficient  estate  and  ability  to  do  so.* 
In  the  Frame  of  Government  drawn  up  in  1696  by  Deputy  Gov- 
ernor Markham  and  accepted  by  the  Assembly,  the  educational 
provisions  which  had  been  contained  in  the  charters  of  1682  and 
1683,  but  omitted  from  the  Petition  of  Right  of  1693,  were 
renewed.^ 

The  founder  of  our  Commonwealth  had  undoubtedly  the  idea 
of  a  universal  and  compulsory  education.  The  religious  belief 
of  the  Friends  implied  a  democracy.  All  men  stood  on  common 
ground;  titles  and  rank  had  no  significance;  even  the  priestly 
order  was  abolished,  and  the  time-honored  distinction  between 
clergyman  and  layman  was  swept  aside.  It  may  be  possible 
that  by  the  elimination  of  the  clergyman  who  had  during  cen- 
turies of  mediaeval  development  represented  the  educational 
ideal  of  the  old  world  the  Quaker  was  unwittingly  taking  the 
first  steps  toward  the  discouragement  of  popular  education,  and 
the  lowering  of  popular  intellectual  standards.  This  may 
sound  like  a  paradox,  but  when  the  development  of  Quaker 

^  Ibid.,  p.  96. 

*  Ibid.,  p.  123. 

•  Ibid.,  p.  142. 

*  Ibid.,  p.  238. 

•  Clews:  Educational  Legislation  and  Administration,  p.  283.  (Cf. 
Charters  and  Laws,  p.  251.) 


10  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

ideals  in  Pennsylvania  is  compared  with  that  of  the  New  England 
basic  conception,  and  the  logical  and  inevitable  sequences  of 
both  are  laid  side  by  side,  its  truth  will  probably  be  admitted. 

The  first  school  in  the  province  appears  to  have  been  one 
established  in  1683  in  which  such  children  were  taught  as  had 
parents  who  were  able  and  willing  to  pay  the  specific  sums 
which  were  agreed  upon  by  the  Governor  and  Council  and  the 
teacher,  Enoch  Flower,  for  instruction  in  the  various  branches. 
No  provision  was  made  for  those  who  had  not  the  means  to 
pay.^  But  Penn  had  in  mind  the  establishment  of  a  school  of 
higher  grade,  and  also  of  giving  educational  opportunity  to  more 
than  a  favored  few.  Clarkson^  says  that  in  1689  Penn  instructed 
Thomas  Lloyd  "to  set  up  a  public  grammar  school."  This  was 
effected  by  the  establishment  of  the  ''William  Penn  Charter 
School,"  first  chartered  in  1697.  By  the  phrase  "public  gram- 
mar school"  it  is  generally  supposed  that  Penn  had  in  mind  a 
school  similar  to  the  type  so  designated  in  England.  Much 
discussion  has  centered  about  the  significance  of  the  term,  also 
of  "free  school"  often  used.  The  question  is  of  interest  in 
determining  just  what  the  colonial  founders  meant,  not  only 
Penn,  but  also  the  New  England  colonists  when  they  spoke  of  a 
"grammar  school,"  a  "free  school,"  or  a  "public  school." 
By  the  phrase  "public  grammar  school"  Penn  was  probably 
thinking  of  an  institution  of  the  sort  with  which  he  was  familiar 
at  home.  Towns  in  England  established  such  schools  and  pro- 
vided in  various  ways  for  their  support,  a  mode  which  was 
effective  in  New  England  from  the  outset.  Even  in  the  Middle 
Ages  a  sense  of  municipal  responsibility  for  the  support  of 
schools  was  found  in  England,  Scotland  and  Germany.^    The 

1  Wickersham:  Op.  cit.,  p.  41. 

2  Clarkson:   Life  of  Penn,  p.  209. 

At  a  meeting  of  the  Council  in  1697,  a  petition  was  presented  from  a 
number  of  Quakers,  who  affirmed  that  many  desired  that  a  school  should  be 
set  up  in  Philadelphia  where  poor  children  might  be  freely  maintained,  taught 
and  educated  in  good  literature,  until  they  were  fit  to  be  put  out  as  appren- 
tices, or  capable  of  being  masters  or  ushers  in  the  school.  All  children  and 
servants,  male  and  female,  were  to  be  admitted  to  this  "public  school,"  the 
rich  at  reasonable  rates,  and  the  poor  for  nothing  (Clews,  op.  cit.,  pp.  284, 
285).  The  school  was  probably  already  in  existence  and  was  probably 
chartered  in  response  to  this  petition  (Ibid.,  p.  286). 

'  Brown:  The  Making  of  our  Middle  Schools,  p.  43. 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  i  i 

idea  of  provision  for  education  by  local  authorities  developed 
in  England  during  the  reign  of  Queen  Elizabeth,  and  the  history 
of  state  aid  in  education  dates  from  about  this  time.^  Dr. 
Brown  quotes  Christopher  Wase,  an  Oxford  man,  who  writing 
in  1678,  stated  that  "there  are  of  late  Grammar  Schools  founded 
and  endowed  in  almost  every  Market  Town  of  England  in  which 
the  children  of  the  town  are  to  receive  instruction  free  of  charge.  "^ 
The  term  "public  school,"  as  is  well  known,  applies  in  England 
today  to  similar  schools  founded  and  endowed  either  by  a  private 
individual,  a  corporation  or  a  municipality.  Eton  and  Rugby 
are  famous  "pubHc  schools."  The  term  "grammar  school" 
indicated  the  grade  as  secondary,  not  elementary,  at  least 
theoretically  (practically  the  pupils  often  had  still  to  master 
the  elements  of  instruction) ;  and  the  curriculum  as  including 
the  classical  languages,  particularly  Latin.^  Such  schools  were 
often  called  "free  schools,"  and  the  exact  interpretation  of  this 
term  is  naturally  the  crux  of  the  discussion.  It  has  been  held  to 
mean  not  a  school  in  which  instruction  was  necessarily  given  to 
all  without  fee,  for  this  was  not  the  case;  but  a  school  "free" 
or  open  to  the  public,  free  also  from  the  jurisdiction  of  any 
superior  institution,  for  a  "free,"  i.  e.,  a  liberal  education,^ 
tuition  in  the  classics  only  being  free.^  Dr.  Brown^  quotes 
Leach  as  "giving  the  latest  and  perhaps  the  last  word  on  the 
subject."  Leach  discusses  at  length  some  suggested  interpre- 
tations, dismisses  them  and  arrives  at  the  following  conclusion: 
"  It  is  impossible  if  the  phrase  is  regarded  in  its  historical  develop- 
ment .  .  .  that  it  could  have  meant  anything  but  what  it  was 
popularly  supposed  to  mean, — a  school  free  from  payment  of 
tuition  fees.  Entrance  fees  and  all  sorts  of  extras  and  luxuries, 
such  as  fires,  light,  candles,  stationery,  cleaning,  whipping, 
might  have  to  be  paid  for ;  but  a  free  school  meant  undoubtedly 
a  school  in  which,  because  of  endowment,  all  or  some  of  the  scho- 
lars, the  poor  or  the  inhabitants  of  the  place,  or  a  certain  number, 

1  Monroe:  Cyclopaedia  of  Education,  Vol.  II,  p.  431. 

*  Brown:  Op.  cit.,  p.  25. 

•  Brown:  Op.  cit.,  p.  20. 

*U.  S.  Bureau  of  Education,  Report  of   Commissioner,  1896-97,  p.  1168, 
Note  3. 

6  Barnard:  Journal  of  Education,  Vol.  XVI,  p.  402,  note. 
•Op.  cit.,  p.  31. 


12  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

were  freed  from  fees  for  teaching."^  Dr.  Brown  calls  this  "a 
clear  and  carefully  guarded  statement,  and  adds  that  in  our 
early  colonial  period  a  'free  school*-  was  generally  one  in  which 
school  fees  were  regularly  paid  by  all  but  the  poorest  pupils; 
moreover  it  was  a  school  of  secondary  grade,  that  is  a  Latin 
grammar  school.  "2 

One  further  comment  may  be  added  concerning  the  use  of  the 
word  "public"  in  England  as  describing  such  schools.  In  their 
origin,  as  the  history  of  English  education  shows,  they  represent 
the  popular  development  in  education  which  attended  the 
Renaissance.  Renaissance  and  Reformation  were  closely  allied 
movements  in  Northern  and  Protestant  Europe.  The  revival 
of  classical  learning  in  England  and  Germany  was  associated  with 
the  new  attitude  in  religion;  and  the  people,  or  "public,"  as 
distinct  from  the  clergy,  were  now  to  be  provided  with  education 
in  classical  learning  and  religion.  Municipal,  corporate,  private 
or  royal  endowment,  including  free  tuition  for  the  poor,  following 
the  example  of  the  church  schools  of  the  mediaeval  period,^ 
now  provided  education  generously  for  the  people. 

This  question  has  been  discussed  at  length  at  this  point  be- 
cause it  is  of  interest  not  only  in  determining  the  kind  of  school 
that  Penn  had  in  mind  in  his  suggested  plan  for  his  Province,  but 
also  because  it  relates  equally  to  the  intentions  of  the  New  Eng- 
land colonists  in  the  beginning  of  their  educational  foundations. 
It  is  to  be  especially  noted,  however,  that  the  charter  of  Penn's 
school  of  1 70 1,  the  first  actually  on  record,  placed  the  manage- 
ment in  the  hands  of  the  Monthly  Meeting,  and  the  later  one 
of  1708,  took  its  direction  from  that  body  and  appointed  a 
Board  of  Overseers,  "fifteen  discreet  and  religious  Friends," 
to  assume  control.*  It  thus  became  a  private  or  denominational 
institution,  and  so  continues  at  the  present  time.  Branch  char- 
ity schools  of  elementary  grade  were  established  in  different 
parts  of  the  city,  and  these  continued  to  exist  for  more  than  a 
hundred  and  fifty  years,  and  provided  an  education  for  the  poor 

*  Leach:  English  Schools  at  the  Reformation,  pp.  110-114. 
2  Op.  cit.,  p.  32. 

'  U.  S.  Bureau  of  Education,  Report  of  Commissioner,  1896-97,  Chapter 
XXIV,  p.  1 168,  Note  B.  cf.  Barnard,  Journal  of  Education,  Vol.  I,  pp.  298, 
299  note. 

*  Wickersham:  op.  cit.,  p.  44. 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  13 

when  as  yet  there  was  no  public  school  system  in  our  modern 
sense,  and  even  after  there  was.  Some  of  them  were  free,  some 
charged  for  tuition,  and  both  boys  and  girls  were  taught.^  It 
will  thus  be  seen  that  in  the  practical  working  out  of  Penn's 
plans  for  a  universal  education  the  English  ideal,  with  its  aristo- 
cratic social  tendencies,  rather  than  that  of  Puritan  New  England 
appears  from  the  first.  With  the  development  of  popular 
education  in  England  from  the  time  of  Elizabeth  to  the  nine- 
teenth century  the  principle  prevailed  that  it  was  not  the  funct- 
ion of  the  State  to  provide  or  enforce  education.  The  Church 
or  individuals  might  make  charitable  provision  for  the  poor. 
England  had  therefore  not  accepted,  when  Pennsylvania  was 
founded,  the  ideal  of  the  universal  and  compulsory  education 
maintained  by  the  State,  as  proclaimed  by  Luther  and  Calvin; 
but  still  adhered  to  the  older  religious  and  social  ideal,  which 
established  under  the  Protestant  dispensation  schools  for  in- 
struction in  liberal  knowledge  and  religion  in  which  the  poor 
were  to  be  taught  free.  From  the  founding  of  the  William  , 
Penn  Charter  School  until  after  the  close  of  the  third  decade 
of  the  nineteenth  century  Pennsylvania  adhered  to  the  plan  of  a 
free  education  for  those  who  could  not  afford  to  pay  for  it,  while 
the  ideals  of  Penn,  which  might  have  worked  out  into  something 
more  like  the  democratic  arrangements  of  Puritan  New  England, 
were  suppressed  by  a  reversion  to  those  of  the  mother-country. 
Penn  himself  may  have  realized  the  impracticability  of  enforcing 
his  ideal  in  the  clash  of  sectarian  and  governmental  policies 
which  followed  the  rapid  growth  of  the  colony.  Perhaps  he 
saw  that  the  logical  application  of  the  theory  of  popular  education 
would  endanger  the  foundations  of  the  provincial  structure 
which  he  had  reared  .^  His  Charter  of  Privileges  of  1701  con- 
tains no  educational  provision.^  "Little  affecting  the  interests 
of  education  can  be  found  on  record  emanating  from  the  Pro- 
prietor, the  Governor,  the  Provincial  Council  or  the  General 
Assembly  from  Penn's  time  to  the  breaking  out  of  the  Revolu- 
tion."* 

•  Graves:  History  of  Education  in  Modern  Times,  p.  99. 

•  Report  U.  S.  Commissioner  of  Education,  1893-4,  Vol.  I,  p.  701. 

•  Liberty  Bell  Leaflets,  No.  3. 
*Wickersham:  op.  cit.,  p.  52. 


14  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

As  the  state  relinquished  the  original  design  of  the  founder 
for  providing  and  compelling  education,  the  work  was  taken  up 
by  the  various  religious  bodies.  In  17 12  an  act  was  passed  by 
the  Assembly  enabling  Protestant  religious  societies  to  hold 
property  for  religious  and  educational  purposes.  This  was  re- 
pealed by  the  Queen's  Council  the  following  year.^  A  similar 
act  was  passed  in  17 15  but  again  rejected  by  the  English  govern- 
ment, and  repealed  by  the  Lords  Justices  in  Council  in  17 19.2 
In  1730  a  law  was  again  enacted  similarly  enabling  Protestant 
religious  societies  to  hold  property  for  educational  purposes. 
This  was  apparently  never  considered  by  the  Crown  but  allowed 
to  become  a  law  by  the  lapse  of  time  in  accordance  with  the 
Proprietary  Charter.^  The  reasons  for  this  sequence  to  the 
original  broad-minded  plan  of  Penn  for  a  democratic  and  univer- 
sal education  are  to  be  found  in  the  political  and  religious  con- 
flicts which  attended  the  development  of  the  Commonwealth, 
resulting  from  the  great  diversity  of  interests  which  it  contained. 
Penn  had  offered  a  free  asylum  to  men  of  all  religious  beliefs 
and  had  founded  a  democracy.  As  was  inevitable  at  that  date, 
the  result  was  a  struggle  for  supremacy  on  the  part  of  the  leading 
groups  which  disturbed  the  theoretical  harmony  which  was  the 
basis  of  the  structure.  From  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  cen- 
tury the  Quakers  were  unable  to  maintain  a  dominant  position, 
and  with  the  Revolution  and  its  determined  military  resistance 
to  English  tyranny  the  Quaker  supremacy  was  lost. 

The  various  religious  sects  were  devoted  to  their  ecclesiastical 
views  and  most  of  them  were  active  in  education.  The  Friends 
conducted  schools  in  meeting-houses  or  in  schoolhouses  con- 
nected with  them.  Money  was  raised  by  subscription,  legacies 
and  contributions;  endowments  were  provided  and  the  poor 
were  liberally  assisted.  These  schools  were  often  open  to  all  the 
children  of  a  neighborhood,  irrespective  of  creed.  Institutions 
of  higher  than  elementary  grade  were  founded,  and  the  training 
of  teachers  was  encouraged."*  The  Episcopalian  congregations 
also  established  schools  in  connection  with  their  churches,  show- 

*  Statutes  at  Large  of  Pennsylvania,  Vol.  II,  p.  424. 
2  Ibid.,  Vol.  Ill,  pp.  37,  440. 

'  Ibid.,  Vol.  IV,  pp.  209,  210. 

*  Wickersham:  op.  cit.,  pp.  80-94. 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  15 

ing  too,  a  liberal  policy  in  admitting  children  of  other  creeds 
in  the  neighborhood  and  interesting  themselves  in  higher,  as 
well  as  in  elementary  and  religious  education.^ 

The  Germans  who  came  to  Pennsylvania,  like  the  other  sects, 
because  they  found  here  an  opportunity  to  establish  civil  and 
religious  liberty,  were  devout  people  and  usually  brought  with 
them  when  they  came  in  numbers,  clergymen  and  schoolmasters. 
The  first  public  building  erected  by  these  communities  was 
ordinarily  used  both  as  church  and  schoolhouse.  Where  they 
had  one  for  each  purpose  they  generally  stood  side  by  side.  By 
the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century  the  Germans  formed  more 
than  one  third  of  the  population,  but  they  were  scattered  and 
isolated  and  they  lacked  religious  organization.  In  spite  of 
the  fact  that  many  of  their  leaders  were  learned  men,  and  that 
their  ministers  and  schoolmasters  made  creditable  attempts 
to  maintain  schools  for  their  congregations,  educational  facilities 
were  inadequate  and  the  more  thoughtful  among  them  saw  with 
dismay  that  illiteracy  was  increasing.  Even  churches  were 
insufficient  in  number.^  An  appeal  sent  to  the  Lutheran  and 
Reformed  congregations  in  the  mother-country  brought  a  re- 
sponse in  the  sending  of  clergymen  and  money  to  aid  the  cause 
of  religion  and  education  in  America.^  An  organization  was 
formed  in  London  in  1753  called  "The  Society  for  the  Propaga- 
tion of  Christian  Knowledge  among  the  Germans  in  Pennsyl- 
vania."^ In  addition  to  the  original  religious  motives  for  the 
work  among  the  Germans,  political  considerations  were  added, 
and  the  desirability  of  providing  education  in  the  English 
language  for  the  German  population,  in  order  to  make  them  more 
thoroughgoing  English  subjects  appealed  to  the  people  of  England 
who  were  interested  in  the  plan.  Through  the  endeavors  of 
Dr.  Smith,  the  first  Provost  of  the  College  and  Academy  of  the 
City  of  Philadelphia,  afterward  the  University  of  Pennsylvania, 
contributions  were  secured  from  the  Society  for  the  Propagation 
of  the  Gospel  in  Foreign  Parts,  from  royalty  as  well  as  from  other 
individuals  and  a  board  of  trustees  in  the  colony  was  appointed.^ 

1  Ibid.,  p.  98. 

2  Wickersham:  Op.  cit.,  p.  129. 

3  Ibid.,  pp.  130-134- 

♦Weber:  The  Charity  School  Movement  in  Colonial  Pennsylvania,  p.  25; 
*  Ibid.,  p.  30. 


1 6  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

This  plan  involved  a  more  general  aim  than  was  implied  in  its 
original  purpose.  The  Society  proposed  to  educate  children  of 
all  denominations,  and  those  of  English,  as  well  as  of  German 
parentage.  The  fact  that  State  officials  were  trustees  in  the  move- 
ment has  caused  it  to  be  spoken  of  as  the  first  general  system  of 
public  instruction  in  Pennsylvania.^  The  history  of  the  latter  part 
of  the  movement  is  closely  identified  with  that  of  the  University 
of  Pennsylvania,  as  most  of  the  Trustees  of  the  charitable  scheme, 
including  Dr.  Smith  and  Benjamin  Franklin,  were  connected 
with  that  institution,^  whose  origin  goes  back  to  1740,  and  to  a 
building  constructed  for  the  charitable  education  of  poor  chil- 
dren.^ The  Society  continued  its  work  for  ten  years,  when  its 
support  became  irregular,  and  the  funds  remaining  after  the 
close  of  the  schools  in  1764  were  applied  to  the  Charity  Schools 
maintained  by  the  University.  The  influence  of  this  institution 
and  especially  of  Franklin,  its  founder,  on  the  educational  life 
of  the  state,  would  be  matter  for  a  volume  and  beyond  the  limits 
of  this  chapter. 

The  actual  scope  of  the  work  accomplished  by  the  Charitable 
Society  was  somewhat  broader  than  was  indicated  in  their  de- 
signs, with  the  religious  and  political  motives  that  lay  beneath 
these.  In  some  quarters  they  stimulated  local  initiative  for 
education  of  an  unsectarian  kind,  and  therefore  led  to  the 
growth  of  "neighborhood  schools"  which  represented  a  transition 
to  the  ultimate  common  school.  A  manuscript  in  the  Historical 
Society  of  Pennsylvania  records  that  a  number  of  persons  at 
Easton  on  July  31,  1755,  "being  duly  sensible  of  the  great 
advantages  our  posterity  may  reap  from  the  excellent  Charitable 
Scheme  lately  formed  in  England  for  the  education  of  Protestant 
youth,"  engaged  with  a  number  of  Deputy  Trustees  appointed 
by  the  Trustees  general,  "  to  pay  the  sum  of  money  and  do  and 
perform  the  works,  labour  and  service  in  the  building  and  erecting 
of  a  School-House  which  may  occasionally  be  made  use  of  as  a 
church  for  any  Protestant  minister."  The  document  is  signed 
by  sixteen  persons  and  states  the  amount  and  kind  of  labor  or 

*  Ibid.,  p.  41. 
« Ibid.,  p.  55. 

•  Clews:  Op.  cit.,  p.  300.  Cf.  Montgomery:  A  History  of  the  University  of 
Pennsylvania,  p.  no. 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  17 

materials  which  each  will  contribute,  such  as  digging,  carting, 
so  many  days'  work  or  weeks*  work,  shingles,  sashlights,  stone, 
etc.  William  Smith  on  behalf  of  the  Trustees,  promised  thirty 
pounds.^  The  readiness  for  religious  co-operation  is  to  be  noted. 
Another  similar  manuscript  is  preserved  in  the  same  collection 
a  petition  to  the  Trustees  general  of  the  Charity  Scheme  from 
"divers  poor  Germans  settled  in  and  about  Easton,  of  Lutheran, 
Reformed  and  other  Protestant  religions,  who  are  entirely  des- 
titute of  Ministers  and  Schoolmasters,  .  .  .  and  fearful  of 
having  their  children  grow  up  in  a  Protestant  country  without 
the  Knowledge  and  Benefit  for  want  of  a  School  all  being  new 
settlers  and  poor,  ...  have  laid  aside  all  religious  differences 
and  asked  to  be  made  sharers  in  the  Charitable  Scheme. "  They 
asked  for  an  allowance  toward  building  a  suitable  schoolhouse 
and  paying  a  pious,  sober  English  schoolmaster;  they  promised 
to  do  and  even  exceed  all  that  can  be  expected  from  people  in 
their  low  condition .^ 

The  numerous  German  sects  were  undoubtedly  zealous  in 
education  as  in  religion,  and  there  were  many  learned  men 
among  them.  The  Moravians  were  active  and  enlightened  in 
education  of  all  grades,  and  in  missionary  enterprises.  They 
had  endeavored  at  first  to  establish  "union"  schools  in  various 
places,  but  by  1754  these  had  been  given  up  and  they  confined 
their  educational  efforts  to  children  of  their  own  people.^ 

The  Scotch-Irish  were  to  the  west  of  the  other  groups  and  on 
the  frontier.  These  people  made  a  significant  contribution  to 
education  both  of  elementary  and  higher  grade.  They  had 
brought  with  them  from  home  the  intense  Calvinistic  conviction 
of  the  value  of  sound  and  liberal  scholarship,  and  especially 
the  desire  for  an  educated  ministry,  the  ideal  which,  strong  in 
New  England,  had  been  rejected  by  the  Quakers.  Nor  were  they 
lacking  in  energy  to  pursue  this  purpose  in  the  pioneer  conditions 
on  which  they  had  entered.  The  church  and  the  schoolhouse 
were  close  neighbors,  as  with  the  other  sects;  but  since  the 
Calvinistic  idea  never  lost  its  emphasis  on  the  "state"  or  civil 

*  Miscellaneous  MSS.,  1727-1758,  Northampton  County,  Pa.,  p.  159  in 
Historical  Society  of  Pennsylvania. 

2  Ibid.,  p.  161,  indexed  as  "The  Lower  Saucon  Petition  for  a  Free  School." 

*  Weber:  Op.  cit.,  p.  21. 


1 8  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

ideal  in  education,  their  views  as  to  the  purpose  of  the  school 
became  more  liberal,  helped  too,  by  the  frontier  life  which 
tended  to  break  down  the  older  prejudices.  They  too  were  in- 
fluential in  establishing  schools  generally  in  their  communities 
and  in  maintaining  instruction  of  a  liberal  and  practical  charac- 
ter.i 

The  long  and  detailed  catalogue  of  the  educational  activities 
of  the  numerous  religious  bodies  in  Pennsylvania  is  not  within 
the  scope  of  this  chapter,  nor  is  that  of  the  higher  schools, 
academies,  and  colleges  founded  by  them  or  by  private  individuals. 
The  aim  has  been  to  summarize  the  conditions  under  which 
elementary  education  had  developed  in  the  Province  under  the 
fostering  care  of  the  leading  groups  of  its  people. 

Speaking  generally  it  may  be  said  that  in  towns  and  in  more 
thickly  settled  regions  the  sectarian  schools  were  firmly  en- 
trenched. In  the  outlying  districts,  on  the  frontier  where  such  fac- 
ilities did  not  exist  it  was  inevitable  that  the  people  of  a  neighbor- 
hood should  be  drawn  together  by  their  common  educational 
needs  for  their  children.  This  spirit  developed  rapidly  after 
the  Revolution,  which  broke  down  the  barriers  and  united  the 
people  more  closely  in  a  common  aim  for  the  welfare  of  all. 
In  this  connection  reference  may  be  made  to  an  unsectarian 
association  which  was  formed  in  1791  in  Philadelphia  called 
"The  First  Day  or  Sunday  School  Society."  The  aim  was  to 
provide  an  elementary  education  for  poor  children,  especially 
such  as  were  employed  during  the  week.^  The  Society  applied 
to  the  Legislature  for  aid,  and  the  question  of  schools  for  the 
people  supported  in  part  by  taxation  was  broached.  The  Quakers 
opposed  the  plan,  and  it  failed.^  The  idea  that  the  education  of 
the  poor  was  a  philanthropy,  emanating  from  the  religious  spirit, 
not  a  civic  obligation,  was  firmly  grounded  in  the  province,  and 
continued  to  be  a  controlling  principle  in  educational  legislation 
and  in  the  practice  of  the  greater  portion  of  the  State  until  the 
nineteenth  century  was  well  under  way.  Nor  had  this  sectarian 
and  charitable  education  proved  its  right  to  existence  in  the 
century  following  its  establishment.     "In   1775  not  only  was 

1  Wickersham:  Op.  cit.,  pp.  104-114. 

2  Graves:  Op.  cit.,  p.  52. 

'  McMaster:  History  of  the  People  of  the  United  States,  Vol.  II,  pp.  84,  85. 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  19 

the  number  of  scholarly  men  in  the  province  small,  but  compara- 
tively few  grown  persons  could  do  more  than  read,  write  and 
calculate  according  to  the  elementary  rules  of  arithmetic,  and 
many  remained  wholly  illiterate."^  Educationally  speaking 
this  was  the  State  into  which  just  before  the  Revolution  a  new 
group,  small  in  numbers,  but  strong  in  persistence  and  courage, 
were  to  fight  their  way  and  take  up  their  abode,  bringing  with 
them  the  clear  convictions  and  well  thought-out  ideals  of  the 
common  school  as  established  in  their  New  England  home, 
ultimately  to  identify  themselves  and  their  conception  with 
the  great  Commonwealth  of  their  adoption. 

1  Wickersham:  Op.  cit.,  p.  255.     Cf.  Report,  U.  S.  Commissioner  of  Educa- 
tion, 1895-96,  Vol.  I,  p.  256. 


CHAPTER  II 
THE  CONNECTICUT   INTRUSION 

A  digression  must  be  made  at  this  point  to  review  the  events 
which  led  to  the  foundation  of  the  civic  and  educational  life  of  the 
Connecticut  colony,  and  to  the  settlement  of  a  group  of  these 
people  in  the  northeastern  part  of  Pennsylvania,  known  as  the 
Wyoming  region;  and  their  energetic  and  finally  successful 
struggle  with  the  Proprietaries  to  secure  that  attractive  territory. 

On  November  3,  1620,  James  I  granted  a  patent  to  the  Ply- 
mouth Company,  numbering  forty  noblemen,  knights  and  gentle- 
men, for  a  territory  from  forty  to  forty-eight  degrees  north  lati- 
tude and  from  sea  to  sea,  this  being  the  general  charter  of  New 
England.^  In  1630  the  Plymouth  Company  are  said  to  have  sold 
to  their  President,  the  Earl  of  Warwick,  that  part  of  their  grant 
which  includes  the  present  state  of  Connecticut.  This  patent 
is  not  of  record  and  is  probably  purely  mythical.^  On  March 
19,  1631,  the  Earl  of  Warwick  granted  to  William,  Viscount 
Say  and  Seal,  Robert,  Lord  Brooke,  and  others  to  the  number 
of  eleven,  the  part  of  New  England  which  extends  "from  the 
Narragansett  River  for  forty  leagues  upon  a  straight  line  near 
the  seashore  towards  the  southwest,  west  and  by  south  or  west  as 
the  coast  lieth  toward  Virginia,  and  extending  from  the  western 
ocean  to  the  south  sea."  This  admittedly  vague  grant  is  the 
original  patent  of  Connecticut.^ 

The  region  about  the  Connecticut  River  was  visited  by  men 
of  the  Plymouth  colony  in  1631  and  1632.*  The  next  year 
Plymouth  invited  the  Massachusetts  colony  to  join  her  in 
establishing  trade  and  in  keeping  off  the  Dutch.  The  first  part 
of  the  invitation,  at  least,  was  declined.  But  the  future  founders 
of  Connecticut  pursued  their  enterprise  with  characteristic 
energy,  several  vessels  going  for  trade  and  some  Dorchester 

*  Trumbull:  History  of  Connecticut,  Vol.  I,  p.  20. 

*  Johnston:  Connecticut,  p.  9. 

'  Trumbull:  Op.  cit.,  Vol.  I,  pp.  27,  28.     Cf.  Appendix,  p.  495. 

*  Ibid.,  Vol.  I,  pp.  29,  30. 

20 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  21 

men  going  overland  in  1633.  The  same  year  William  Holmes 
of  Plymouth  and  a  small  company  established  a  trading  post  on 
the  Connecticut  River  at  the  present  site  of  Windsor .^  Soon 
afterward  the  company  of  Lord  Say  and  Seal  and  Lord  Brooke 
were  stirred  to  action,  and  Saybrook  was  established  in  1635  under 
their  auspices  by  a  party  of  Boston  men  with  John  Winthrop,  Jr., 
as  leader.* 

In  the  meantime,  while  these  sturdy  adventurers  were  leading 
the  way  into  the  wilderness  and  opening  up  new  sites  for  homes, 
religious  and  political  differences  were  splitting  up  the  various 
settlements.  The  aristocratic  and  theocratic  ideas  so  strong 
in  the  Plymouth  and  Massachusetts  colonies  were  vigorously 
opposed  by  groups  of  people  in  Dorchester,  Watertown  and 
Newtown.  The  Massachusetts  policy  was  the  limitation  of  the 
elective  franchise  and  office  holding  to  church  members.^  The 
result  was  the  settlement  by  a  migration  of  the  "opposition," 
of  Wethersfield  by  Watertown  people,  of  Hartford  largely  by 
Newtown  people  and  of  Windsor  by  Dorchester  men.  These 
events  occurred  in  1634  and  1635.^  The  new  towns  were  under 
the  jurisdiction  of  Massachusetts  for  a  time,  but  a  legislature 
made  up  of  magistrates  and  deputies  from  each  town  met  at 
Hartford,  May  i,  1637,  and  the  separate  existence  of  Connecticut 
had  begun. ^  On  May  31,  1638,  Mr.  Hooker,  the  former  New- 
town pastor,  preached  a  sermon  which  "contained  the  funda- 
mental idea  of  the  Connecticut  Constitution,'*  adopted  the 
following  year.^  It  was  the  first  written  Constitution  known 
to  history  that  created  a  government,^  and  "Hartford  is  the 
birthplace  of  American  democracy."^  The  town  was  the  unit 
of  government  and  was  the  basis  of  the  development  of  the 
Commonwealth;  and  since  the  towns  represented  previously 
completely  organized  churches,  church  government  and  town 

1  Ibid.,  Vol.  I,  pp.  33-35- 

2  Ibid.,  Vol.  I,  60-61. 

'  Johnston:  Op.  cit.,  p.  i8. 

*  Trumbull:  Op.  cit.,  Vol.  I,  p.  60.     Cf.  Johnston:  Op.  cit.,  pp.  22-24. 
^  Trumbull:  Op.  cit.,  Vol.  I,  p.  79. 

^  Johnston:  Op.  cit.,  p.  71. 

'  Fiske:  Beginnings  of  New  England,  p.  127. 

*  Johnston:  Op.  cit.,  p.  73. 


22  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

government  were  strictly  co-incident.'  The  congregational 
system,  moreover,  under  which  they  were  organized  arose  in  the 
mother  country,  and  with  it  the  first  foundations  of  their  educa- 
tional systems  were  laid.  The  three  churches  of  Windsor, 
Hartford  and  Wethersfield  were  gathered  antecedently  to  their 
settlement  in  Connecticut,  ''and  it  does  not  appear  that  they 
were  ever  re-gathered. "  The  organization  of  the  churches  in  the 
mother  country  in  conformity  with  the  custom  of  the  Reformed 
faith,  included  not  only  a  pastor  proper,  but  an  additional  min- 
ister with  the  function  of  teacher,  who  had  the  oversight  of  the 
doctrinal  defense  of  the  church,  and  took  charge  of  the  instruction 
of  the  people.^  Thus  the  Connecticut  settlers  carried  with  them 
from  the  Massachusetts  jurisdiction  the  essential  beginning 
of  their  system  of  public  instruction  for  the  citizens  of  the  democ- 
racy which  they  were  about  establish.  The  colony  of  New 
Haven,  founded  in  1638,  one  year  after  its  establishment,  took 
similar  steps  toward  laying  secure  educational  foundations, 
and  these  two  colonies  began  therefore  one  of  the  first  public 
school  systems  in  the  world's  history.^  The  educational  develop- 
ments arising  from  these  important  beginnings  are  to  be  con- 
sidered later. 

With  the  accession  of  Charles  H  the  Connecticut  people 
sought  and  received  a  charter,  which  gave  to  the  colonies  a 
corporate  existence,  "and  a  legal  sanction  to  the  community 
which  had  already  been  established  by  popular  will."^  By  the 
charter  the  colony  was  to  include  "all  that  part  of  the  New 
England  dominion  in  America  bordered  on  the  east  by  the  Nar- 
ragansett  River  commonly  called  the  Narragansett  Bay,  where 
the  said  river  falleth  into  the  sea,  and  on  the  north  by  the  line  of 
the  Massachusetts  plantation,  and  on  the  south  by  the  sea;  and 
in  longitude  as  the  line  of  the  Massachusetts  colony  running 
from  east  to  west ;  that  is  to  say  from  the  said  Narragansett  Bay 
on  the  east  to  the  south  sea  on  the  west  part,  with  the  Islands 
thereunto  adjoining."^    The  limits  of  the  charter  grant  thus 

1  Ibid.,  p.  59. 

2  Trumbull:  Op.  cit.,  Vol.  I,  pp.  23,  26. 

'  Bureau  of  Education  Circular  of  Information,  No.  2,  1893.      Steiner, 
The  History  of  Education  in  Connecticut,  Introduction. 
*  Johnston:  Op.  cit.,  p.  166. 
^  Trumbull:  Op.  cit.,  Vol.  I,  p.  249. 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  23 

included  the  territory  in  which  the  colony  of  New  Haven  was 
situated ;  and  as  was  customary  in  most  early  patents,  dominion 
over  the  land  west  to  the  Pacific  Ocean.  The  charter  to  Con- 
necticut was  followed  in  1664  by  the  grant  of  the  New  Nether- 
lands province,  including  New  Jersey  and  part  of  New  England, 
to  the  Duke  of  York.  This  was  interpreted  by  Connecticut  as 
interrupting  but  not  terminating  her  claim  west  of  the  New 
Netherlands  grant.^ 

Nineteen  years  after  the  grant  of  the  Connecticut  charter,  in 
1 68 1  William  Penn  received  from  Charles  his  grant  of  Pennsyl- 
vania, thus  establishing  a  counter  claim  to  that  part  of  the  prov- 
ince already  claimed  by  Connecticut,  almost  a  third  of  the 
northern  portion  of  the  present  state.  Penn  took  the  precaution 
to  secure  a  release  from  the  Duke  of  York  of  any  right  which  the 
latter  had  to  his  Pennsylvania  grant.^  But  the  question  of 
ownership  of  this  territory  became  a  vital  one  in  the  development 
of  the  future  state  of  Pennsylvania,  and  led  to  a  series  of  tragic 
events  resulting  from  the  tenacity  with  which  the  Connecticut 
people  insisted  on  what  they  claimed  as  their  charter  rights, 
and  pursued  their  plans  for  settlement  outside  of  their  immediate 
territorial  limits.  It  brought  to  the  two  states  legal  controversy 
as  well  as  warfare,  and  the  problems  which  were  not  finally 
adjusted   until   after   the  opening  of   the   nineteenth   century. 

In  the  period  following  the  grant  of  his  province  to  Penn  until 
about  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century  Connecticut  was 
growing  in  population,  increasing  the  number  of  her  towns, 
and  taking  up  the  "land  that  was  fit  for  planting."^  What  re- 
mained was  calculated  rather  to  develop  energy,  perseverance 
under  difficulties,  and  stern  moral  fibre  than  to  hold  out  alluring- 
prospects  of  easy  returns  for  human  labor.  By  1762  all  the  soil 
had  been  laid  out  in  townships,  and  after  that  new  towns  were 
laid  out  from  those  already  existing.^  About  this  time  the  people 
turned  to  the  fairer  land  of  promise  toward  the  western  part  of 
their  charter  claim.  Exploring  parties  went  from  1750  each 
season  through  the  wilderness  and  reported  the  charms  and 

^  Fisher:  Making  of  Pennsylvania,  p.  239, 

2  Ibid.,  p.  27. 

'  Johnston:  Op.  cit.,  p.  266. 

*  Ibid.,  p.  271. 


24  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

beauties  of  the  Wyoming  country  to  those  at  home.*  The  first 
route  by  which  the  Delaware  and  Susquehanna  were  connected 
is  said  to  have  been  over  an  Indian  path  leading  from  Cochecton 
in  New  York  on  the  Delaware  across  the  Moosic  mountain  to  a 
point  near  the  present  site  of  Scran  ton,  thence  into  the  Wyoming 
valley.^  The  wagon  road  from  the  Hudson  valley  led  to  this  trail 
because  it  was  the  most  direct  route  from  Connecticut  to  Wyom- 
ing. 

These  longings  now  crystallized  into  a  definite  attempt  to 
colonize  the  Wyoming  region,  thus  making  it  in  fact  as  well  as  in 
theory  a  portion  of  the  home  colony.  The  originators  of  this 
scheme  are  unknown,  but  it  was  soon  published  and  discussed 
in  several  townships  of  Windham  county.^  In  1753  the  Sus- 
quehanna Company  was  formed  consisting  of  six  hundred  and 
seventy-three  persons,  ten  of  whom  were  Pennsylvanians,  and  the 
rest  people  of  New  England,  principally  of  Connecticut,  who 
had  formed  themselves  into  an  association  for  the  purpose  of 
planting  a  colony  in  that  territory.  They  had  already  laid 
their  plans  before  the  General  Assembly  of  Connecticut,  stating 
their  desire  to  settle  on  the  Susquehanna  within  the  charter 
limits  of  the  colony  of  Connecticut,  no  English  inhabitants 
living  in  the  land,  the  tract  containing  sixteen  miles  square  on 
both  sides  of  the  river.  Their  plan  was  to  purchase  it  from  the 
Indians,  and  in  case  they  should  be  able  to  hold  and  possess  the 
land  they  promised  to  live  always  under  the  laws  and  discipline 
of  the  home  colony,  provided  that  the  subscribers  should  settle 
the  territory  and  lay  it  out  in  equal  proportion  within  three  years."* 
Commissioners  were  sent  during  the  same  year  to  explore  the 

'      f  Peck:  History  of  Wyoming,  pp.  14,  17. 

rEgle:  History  of  Pennsylvania,  p.  1148. 

'  Hoyt:  Brief  of  a  Title,  p.  11. 

*  Ibid.,  pp.  12,  13. 

Note:  In  the  development  of  new  towns  in  Connecticut  it  was  usual  for 
a  speculator  to  buy  land  from  the  Indians,  with  the  approval  of  the  General 
Assembly.  As  soon  as  the  rates  became  sufficiently  large  to  need  the  exten- 
sion of  the  Assembly's  taxing  power  over  the  community  a  committee  was 
appointed  by  that  body  to  bound  out  the  town;  it  was  then  in  order  to  choose 
constables  and  send  delegates  to  the  Assembly.  Clark:  History  of  Connecti- 
cut, p.  196. 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  25 

region  and  establish  a  friendly  relation  with  the  Indians.^  The 
project  soon  spread  through  the  colony  and  residents  of  several 
counties  were  received  into  membership  in  the  company .^  The 
price  of  shares  increased  rapidly.^  The  company  proposed 
subsequently  to  apply  to  the  King  for  a  charter  of  government, 
first  securing  by  purchase  from  the  Six  Nations  the  Indian  title 
to  the  land.  At  a  general  treaty  of  the  Indians  with  the  colonies 
held  at  Albany  on  July  11,  1754,  the  Susquehanna  Company 
purchased  from  the  Indians  a  tract  of  land  described  iji  the  deed 
as  "beginning  from  the  one  and  fortieth  degree  of  north  latitude 
at  ten  miles  east  of  the  Susquehanna  River  and  from  thence 
with  a  northward  line  ten  miles  east  of  the  River  to  the  forty- 
second  or  beginning  of  the  forty-third  degree  of  north  latitude, 
and  so  on  to  extend  west  two  degrees  of  longitude  one  hundred 
and  twenty  miles,  and  from  thence  south  to  the  beginning  of  the 
forty-second  degree  and  from  thence  east  to  the  above-mentioned 
boundary  which  is  ten  miles  east  of  the  Susquehanna  River."* 
This  deed  granted  the  Pennsylvania  territory  to  six  hundred  and 
ninety-four  persons,  of  whom  six  hundred  and  thirty-eight  were 
from  Connecticut,  thirty-three  from  Rhode  Island,  ten  from 
Pennsylvania,  five  from  Massachusetts  and  eight  from  New 
York.^  The  purchase  included  the  Wyoming  Valley  and  the 
country  westward  as  far  as  a  line  extending  through  the  present 
McKean  County  (including  the  eastern  portion  of  the  county) 
and  continuing  through  Elk  and  Clearfield  County.®  The  name 
Wyoming  was  subsequently  used  in  two  senses;  in  the  limited 
sense,  it  meant  the  valley  twenty  miles  in  length  and  three  to 
four  in  width;  but  in  a  larger  usage  it  referred  to  all  of  the  ter- 
ritory included  in  the  Susquehanna  purchase  and  later  claimed 
by  Connecticut,  extending  westward  as  above  indicated.^  The 
country  lying  between  the  line  running  ten  miles  east  of  the 
Susquehanna  and  Delaware  River  was  later  purchased  informally 
by  another  association  called  at  first  the  Delaware  Company, 

*  Pennsylvania  Archives,  Second  Series,  Vol.  XVIII,  p.  15. 

*  Ibid.,  p.  16. 

*  Larned:  History  of  Windham  County,  Vol.  I,  p.  558. 

*  Chapman:  Sketch  of  the  History  of  Wyoming,  p.  55. 
'  Hoyt:  Op.  cit.,  p.  13. 

*  Harvey:  Op.  cit..  Vol.  II,  map:  p.  790. 
'  Miner:  Op.  cit..  Introduction,  p.  xi. 


26  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

later  the  Connecticut-Delaware  Company.^  Pennsylvania  tried 
ineffectually  to  prevent  the  sale  to  the  Susquehanna  Company^ 
and  communications  with  reference  to  the  matter  passed  between 
the  governors  of  the  two  colonies.  The  attention  of  the  Connecti- 
cut authorities  was  called  to  a  deed  of  1736  in  which  the  Indians 
had  engaged  to  sell  all  the  lands  of  Pennsylvania  to  William 
Penn  and  to  no  one  else.  But  the  numbers  in  the  company 
were  increasing,  prices  of  shares  were  rising,  and  in  1755  the 
Company  applied  to  the  legislature  of  Connecticut  asking  their 
concurrence  in  a  request  to  the  King  for  a  charter  for  a  new 
colonial  government  in  the  limits  of  their  purchase.  The 
legislature  passed  a  resolution  approving  of  the  measure,  and 
'  recommending  the  Company  to  the  King's  favor .^  The  King, 
however,  never  acted  favorably  on  their  petition.^  In  the  spring 
or  summer  of  this  year  (1755)  some  of  the  proprietors  of  the 
company  visited  Wyoming,  with  a  view  to  planning  for  the 
settlement.^  The  Delaware  Company  commenced  operations 
on  their  purchase  in  1757,  effecting  a  settlement  at  Damascus 
on  the  Delaware  (in  the  present  Wayne  County).  This  settle- 
ment seems  to  have  prospered  for  several  years.^  By  a  vote  of 
the  Company  on  April  9,  1761,  the  operations  of  the  Susque- 
hanna and  Delaware  Companies  were  to  be  conducted  jointly, 
and  their  purchase  made  into  one  civil  government.® 

In  September,  1762,  the  Susquehanna  Company  sent  more 
than  one  hundred  men  to  Wyoming.  They  commenced  a  settle- 
ment near  the  present  limits  of  the  city  of  Wilkes-Barre,  but 
not  having  sufficient  provisions  for  the  winter  in  November 
they  concealed  their  tools  from  the  Indians  and  returned  home.^ 
In  the  spring  of  the  following  year  they  returned  with  their 
families,  and  took  possession  of  their  former  settlement.     The 

1  Harvey:  Op.  cit.,  Vol.  I,  p.  293.  / 

*  Chapman:  Op.  cit.,  p.  62. 
'  Hoyt:  Op.  cit.,  p.  14. 

*  Harvey:  Op.  cit.,  Vol.  I,  p.  317. 
^  Miner:  Op.  cit.,  p.  70. 

*  Pennsylvania  Archives,  Second  Series,  Vol.  XVIII,  p.  36. 
'  Harvey:  Op.  cit..  Vol.  I,  pp.  402-404. 

Note.  An  attempt  had  been  made  in  1670  by  Connecticut  people  to  estab- 
lish a  colony  at  the  Minisink  near  the  Delaware  Water  Gap,  but  the  plan  was 
given  up  because  the  Indian  title  had  not  been  extinguished.  Miner:  Op. 
cit.,  p.  70. 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  27 

Indians  were  still  on  the  warpath  and  a  general  massacre  followed 
which  put  an  end  temporarily  to  the  undertaking;  and  the 
settlers  fled  for  their  lives.^ 

In  the  meantime  at  a  meeting  of  the  Susquehanna  Company 
on  April  17,  1763,  it  was  voted  to  lay  out  townships  for  the 
speedy  settlement  of  the  land;  eight  townships  were  to  be  laid 
out  on  the  river,  each  to  be  five  miles  square.  All  beds  of  mine 
ore  and  coal  were  to  be  reserved  for  the  use  of  the  company,  and 
for  their  after  disposal  .^  The  Connecticut  people  were  thus 
already  entering  on  a  policy  of  conservation  and  public  owner- 
ship of  public  utilities.  At  the  same  meeting  it  was  also  voted 
that  "some  proper  well  disposed  person,  or  persons,  be  pro- 
cured by  those  persons  who  shall  undertake  to  settle  on  the 
Susquehanna  lands,  ...  in  order  to  be  as  a  head  or  teacher, 
to  carry  on  religious  instructions  and  worship  among  the  settlers, 
to  wit.,  of  such  denomination  as  by  any  particular  number  may 
be  agreed  upon,  and  to  be  at  the  expense  of  those  persons  of 
such  denomination,  as  such  persons  so  procured  shall  be  until 
some  further  regulation  can  be  had."^  This  action  carries 
strong  proof  that  while  the  settlers  had  the  old-fashioned  New 
England  conviction  of  the  necessity  of  religious  ministration 
and  education,  yet  they  had  gone  far  on  the  road  to  the  separa- 
tion of  religious  and  civil  interests,  and  were  ready  not  only  to 
exercise  religious  toleration,  but  to  make  the  maintenance  of 
religious  exercises  a  private,  rather  than  a  public  charge.  The 
Indian  hostilities  delayed  the  enterprise  but  meetings  were  held 
at  intervals  during  the  next  five  years  for  the  purpose  of  for- 
warding the  Company's  interests  with  the  King.  At  a  meeting 
on  January  6,  1768,  definite  steps  were  taken  to  secure  his 
Majesty's  confirmation  of  the  purchase  and  his  consent  to  their 
formation  "into  a  distinct  colony  for  the  purpose  of  civil  govern- 
ment."^ The  Proprietaries  of  Pennsylvania  were  alarmed  at 
the  advance  of  the  Connecticut  movement  and  both  colonies 
sought  legal  decisions  in  the  matter  of  the  ownership  of  the  land.^ 

^  Chapman:  Op.  cit.,  p.  64  flF.     Cf.  Harvey:  Op.  cit.,  Vol.  I,  p.  431. 
2  Pennsylvania  Archives,  Second  Series,  Vol.  XVIII,  p.  47. 
'  Ibid.,  p.  49. 
*  Ibid.,  pp.  50-57- 

'  Chapman:  Op.  cit.,  pp.  65-68.      Cf.   Penna.  Archives,  Second  Series, 
Vol.  XVIII,  p.  88. 


28  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

In  1763  a  deed  to  the  Susquehanna  Company  confirming  the 
sale  of  the  Wyoming  lands  was  executed  by  the  Six  Nations.^ 
The  Proprietaries  of  Pennsylvania,  however,  secured  in  1768 
from  the  Six  Nations  a  deed  for  all  the  lands  in  the  province 
not  previously  sold  to  them,  this  including  most  of  the  lands 
of  the  Susquehanna  and  Delaware  purchases.^  The  Company 
took  immediate  steps,  therefore,  to  prosecute  their  claim  by 
possession;  and  at  a  meeting  held  in  Hartford,  December  28, 
1768,  it  was  resolved  that  forty  persons  upwards  of  the  age  of 
twenty-one  years,  proprietors  in  the  purchase,  should  be  sent 
to  take  possession  of  the  land  by  the  first  day  of  the  February 
following ;  that  two  hundred  more  were  to  follow  early  in  the 
spring.  Two  hundred  pounds  were  allowed  for  the  expenses 
of  the  expedition.  Five  townships,  each  five  miles  square, 
three  on  one  side  of  the  river  and  two  on  the  other,  were  to  be 
laid  out.  The  first  forty  were  to  have  their  choice  of  one  of  the 
townships,  the  four  remaining  to  belong  to  the  two  hundred. 
Three  whole  rights  or  shares  in  each  township  were  to  be  re- 
served and  appropriated  ''for  the  public  use  of  a  gospel  ministry 
and  schools  in  each  of  said  towns."  As  before,  all  beds  of  mine 
ore  and  coal  were  reserved  for  the  after  disposal  of  the  company 
and  the  resolution  of  the  meeting  of  April  17,  1763,  making 
provision  for  the  securing  of  a  minister  was  repeated.  It  was 
also  voted  "to  grant  to  Dr.  Eleazar  Wheelock  a  tract  of  land  in 
the  easterly  part  of  the  Susquehanna  purchase,  ten  miles  long, 
and  six  miles  wide  for  the  use  of  the  Indian  school  under  his 
care.  Provided,  he  shall  set  up  and  keep  said  school  on  the 
premises."  A  committee  of  five  was  appointed  to  order  the 
affairs  and  proceedings  of  the  forty,  which  might  be  increased 
to  nine  when  the  two  hundred  arrived.  Appeal  might  be  made 
from  the  decisions  of  this  committee  to  the  company  at  a  later 
meeting  of  that  body.^  The  five  townships  so  assigned  and  laid 
out  were  Wilkes-Barre,  Hanover,  Pittston,  Kingston  and  Ply- 
mouth.* 

The  Proprietaries  had  laid  out  the  "manors"  of  Sunbury  and 

*  Harvey:  Op.  cit..  Vol.  I,  p.  10. 
2  Ibid.,  Vol.  I,  p.  452. 

'  Pennsylvania  Archives,  Second  Series,  Vol.  XVIII,  pp.  59-62. 

*  Hoyt:  Op.  cit.,  p.  19. 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  29 

Stoke  in  the  limits  of  the  Susquehanna  purchase,^  and  they  now 
made  a  counter  move  by  leasing  one  hundred  acres  in  Wyoming 
for  seven  years  to  three  men  who  were  to  establish  a  trading 
post  and  defend  the  region  against  all  enemies.  These  arrived  in 
January,  1769,  taking  possession  of  the  improvements  which 
had  been  left  by  the  Connecticut  people  when  they  fled  from  the 
Indians  in  1763.^  On  February  8,  the  forty  sent  by  the  Sus- 
quehanna Company  reached  the  ground.  Trouble  ensued,  and 
in  spite  of  the  two  hundred  who  arrived  in  the  spring,  according 
to  the  program,  the  net  result  at  this  time  was  the  abandon- 
ment of  the  undertaking  and  the  return  of  the  settlers  to  their 
homes.  Still  they  were  not  discouraged,  and  returning  later 
with  the  assistance  of  some  Pennsylvanians  from  Lancaster 
County,  after  a  series  of  military  encounters  of  the  "border 
warfare"  style,  in  1771  they  were  left  in  possession  of  the  field. 
This  preliminary  conflict  closed  with  a  victory  for  the  New 
England  men.^ 

In  the  meantime  unsuccessful  attempts  at  a  negotiation  of 
the  difficulties  had  been  made  by  Connecticut,  and  by  1771 
Pennsylvania  was  ready  to  seek  an  adjustment.  When  Governor 
Trumbull  of  Connecticut  was  asked  whether  the  Connecticut 
proceedings  were  authorized  he  replied  that  the  General  As- 
sembly would  countenance  no  violent  or  hostile  measures  to 
vindicate  the  rights  of  the  Susquehanna  Company.^  Fisher 
comments  on  the  shrewd  position  taken  by  the  authorities  of 
Connecticut.  In  their  official  capacity  they  disowned  the 
aggressions  of  the  company,  while  as  individuals  they  were 
financially  interested.  When  accused  as  a  company  they  called 
on  the  government  to  shoulder  the  blame,  and  vice  versa.^ 
By  this  time  the  Wyoming  settlers  with  their  constantly  in- 
creasing numbers  were  too  strong  for  the  Proprietaries,  and  the 
Pennsylvania  troops  were  withdrawn.  In  the  meantime  the 
settlers  had  petitioned  the  General  Assembly  of  Connecticut 
to  erect  Wyoming  into  a  county.^     Northumberland  County, 

^  Harvey:  Op.  cit.,  Vol.  I,  p.  456. 

*  Ibid.,  Vol.  I,  pp.  457-460. 

'  Chapman:  Op.  cit.,  p.  94.     Cf.  Harvey:  Op.  cit.,  VoL  II,  p.  703. 

*  Colonial  Records,  Vol.  10,  pp.  3,  4.     Cf.  pp.  112,  143. 

*  Op.  cit.,  p.  274. 

'  Harvey:  Op.  cit..  Vol.  I,  p.  509. 


30  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

comprehending  the  Wyoming  Valley,  was  erected  by  Act  of  the 
Pennsylvania  Assembly  in  March,  1772.  The  Susquehanna 
Company,  at  a  meeting  in  Hartford  on  June  2,  1773,  "having 
applied  to  counsel  learned  in  the  law  in  Great  Britain  for  their 
advice  which  the  colony  had  not  yet  received,  and  there  being 
no  civil  authority  in  said  settlement,"  adopted  the  "Articles 
of  Agreement"  for  the  government  of  the  settlers.  These  pro- 
vided for  the  election  of  three  able  and  judicious  men  in  each 
town,  and  a  constable,  these  to  meet  on  the  first  Monday  in 
each  month,  or  oftener  if  need  be;  the  directors  of  each  individual 
town  or  plantation  were  to  meet  once  every  quarter  and  come  to 
resolutions  for  the  good  of  the  settlement  and  hear  complaints 
of  such  as  were  entitled  to  appeal  from  the  decision  of  the  di- 
rectors in  the  several  towns.^ 

In  1774  Connecticut  erected  the  town  of  Westmoreland  out 
of  the  disputed  territory,  annexing  it  to  Litchfield  County. 
A  "town"  in  Connecticut  is  a  municipal  district  equivalent  to 
what  is  called  a  township  in  Pennsylvania  and  elsewhere.  With- 
in it  may  be  several  villages  and  cities.^  This  "  town  "  comprised 
the  whole  of  the  territory  which  had  been  purchased  from  the 
Indians  by  the  Delaware  Company,  and  a  small  portion  of  that 
included  in  the  Susquehanna  purchase.  Its  eastern  boundary 
was  the  Delaware  River,  its  western  a  line  running  north  and 
south  fifteen  miles  west  of  Wilkes-Barre.  The  western  boundary 
was  twice  extended  in  1775,  finally  reaching  a  line  fifteen  English 
miles  west  of  the  east  branch  of  the  Susquehanna.^  In  1776 
Westmoreland  was  erected  into  a  county,  with  the  same  limits 
as  the  town.^  The  "townships"  were  the  local  districts  five 
and  six  miles  square  laid  out  by  the  Susquehanna  and  Delaware 
Companies.  The  laws  of  Connecticut  were  in  force  and  repre- 
sentatives were  elected  to  the  Connecticut  legislature  from  1774 
until  the  time  of  the  Trenton  Decree.^  Lines  from  the  dis- 
trict formed  the  twenty-fourth  Connecticut  regiment  in  the 
Continental  army.^ 

*  Pennsylvania  Archives,  Second  Series,  Vol.  XVIII,  pp.  81-91. 
2  Harvey:  Op.  cit.,  Vol.  I,  p.  248.     Note. 

8  Harvey:  Op.  cit.,  Vol.  H,  p.  864.     Cf.  map  opp.  p.  790. 

*  Ibid.,  Vol.  n,  p.  907. 

^  Miner:  Op.  cit.,  p.  308. 
•Johnston:  Op.  cit.,  p.  278. 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  31 

It  is  not  to  the  purpose  of  this  discussion  to  follow  the  later 
details  of  the  Wyoming  difficulties;  the  narrative  has  been 
fully  told  in  the  older  and  the  more  recent  histories.  Nor  is  it  a 
part  of  this  discussion  to  enter  into  the  disputes  concerning  title 
to  land.  Hoyt^  sets  forth  the  claim  of  Connecticut,  and  the 
paper  attributed  to  Dr.  Smith,  the  first  Provost  of  the  University 
of  Pennsylvania,  that  of  Pennsylvania.^  Of  recent  historians, 
Johnston^  discusses  briefly  the  Connecticut  rights,  and  Fisher* 
sums  up  for  Pennsylvania.  The  Revolution  changed  the  face 
of  the  controversy  by  crystallizing  in  Pennsylvania  the  popular 
effort  to  get  rid  of  the  Proprietaries.  The  Penns  had  sold  land 
to  private  individuals  in  the  two  manors  of  Stoke  and  Sunbury. 
This  gave  to  the  controversy  the  aspect  of  a  private  dispute 
about  land.  The  Connecticut  people  were  now  serving  in  the 
Continental  army,  and  private  feuds  were  necessarily  to  a  large 
extent  ignored  in  the  face  of  a  common  danger.  Some  New 
Englanders  had  established  in  1 771  a  settlement  outside  of 
Westmoreland,  and  fresh  quarrels  and  disturbances  occurred.^ 
British  alliances  with  the  Indians  brought  on  the  terrible  tragedy 
of  the  "Wyoming  massacre,"  or  invasion,  of  1778.  With  the 
close  of  the  Revolution  Pennsylvania  appealed  to  Congress  to 
settle  the  dispute.  A  Court  of  Commissioners  was  mutually 
agreed  upon,  and  a  decision  in  favor  of  Pennsylvania  was  render- 
ed in  1782.  The  Connecticut  people  were  ready  to  acquiesce, 
but  troublesome  questions  of  titles  to  land  remained.  In  a 
bungling  attempt  to  settle  these  Pennsylvania  reaped  the  con- 
sequences in  another  "Pennamite  War."  These  proceedings 
were  denounced  by  the  people  of  the  state  and  by  the  Council 
of  Censors.^  Meetings  of  the  Susquehanna  Company  were  held 
at  various  times  from  1783  to  1801  to  support  their  claims.^ 
A  project  was  formed  for  making  a  new  state,  and  Oliver  Wolcott 
drew  up  a  Constitution  for  it.^     By  act  of  the  Pennsylvania 

1  Op.  cit., 

2  Pennsylvania  Archives,  Second  Series,  Vol.  XVIII,  pp.  125-214. 

3  Op.  cit.,  Chapter  XV. 

*  Op.  cit.,  Chapter  X. 

*  Miner:  Op.  cit.,  pp.  166-168. 
^  Fisher:  Op.  cit.,  pp.  300-317. 

'  Pennsylvania  Archives,  Second  Series,  Vol.  XVIII,  pp.  104-122. 
'  Hoyt:  Op.  cit.,  p.  73.     See  Appendix  A. 


32  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

legislature  in  1786,  Luzerne  County  was  established  containing 
a  large  portion  of  the  disputed  territory.  Timothy  Pickering 
worked  energetically  to  pacify  the  people  and  win  them  to  sub- 
mission to  the  government  of  Pennsylvania.  They  now  had 
representation  in  the  General  Assembly  of  the  State,  and  the 
controversies  which  remained  were  legal.  These  final  adjust- 
ments were  made  by  a  series  of  legislative  enactments  by  the 
close  of  the  first  decade  of  the  nineteenth  century,  and  peace 
descended  upon  the  district  which  had  known  little  else  than 
conflict  for  forty  years.^ 

The  territory  in  question  embraced  the  whole  or  part  of  the 
present  Wayne,  Pike,  Monroe,  Carbon,  Luzerne,  Lackawanna, 
Wyoming,  Susquehanna,  Bradford,  Sullivan,  Columbia,  Mon- 
tour, Northumberland,  Union,  Centre,  Clinton,  Lycoming, 
Tioga,  Potter,  McKean,  Elk,  Cameron  and  Clearfield  counties. 
Luzerne  County  as  organized  in  1786  included  the  great  body 
of  the  New  England  settlers.  By  later  enactments  of  the 
Legislature  other  counties  or  portions  of  such  have  been  set  off 
from  Luzerne,  or  county  lines  otherwise  altered  so  that  these 
settlers  were  mainly  in  the  present  Luzerne,  Lackawanna,  Sus- 
quehanna, Wayne,  Pike,  Bradford,  and  Potter  counties.  The 
population  of  Luzerne  County  at  the  time  of  its  erection  has 
been  estimated  as  about  two  thousand  seven  hundred .^  The 
settlement  had  been  nourished  in  calamity  but  its  growth  had 
not  been  stifled. 

From  this  survey  of  the  conditions  which  attended  the  settle- 
ment of  this  region  it  is  now  in  order  to  turn  to  its  educational 
history;  and  to  trace  the  origin  of  the  ideals  and  practices 
which  the  Connecticut  settlers  brought  with  them  from  their 
native  state,  endeavoring  to  build  up  a  similar  structure  in  the 
home  of  their  adoption. 

*  Laws  of  Pennsylvania.     Smith's  Laws,  Vol.  Ill,  pp.  367,  368. 
'  Proceedings  and  Collections,  Vol.  XIII,  p.  11 1. 


CHAPTER  III 

THE  EDUCATIONAL  INHERITANCE  OF  THE 
WYOMING  SETTLERS 

Education  in  Connecticut  to  the  Close  of  the  Eighteenth  Century 

The  seeds  of  the  system  of  pubHc  education  which  had  develop- 
ed in  Connecticut  by  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century  were 
sown  in  the  old  world,  when  in  conformity  with  the  custom  of  the 
Reformed  faith,  a  pastor  and  a  teacher  were  chosen  by  the  three 
congregations  which  migrated  to  New  England  and  later  became 
the  founders  of  the  Connecticut  colony.  The  roots  of  their 
educational,  as  of  their  religious  and  political  life,  intermingled 
at  first  with  those  of  the  older  colony.  But  Calvinism  was  a 
progressive  ferment,  and  political  dissent  led  to  the  separation 
of  the  congregations  from  their  brethren  and  to  the  establishment 
in  1634  and  1635  of  the  Connecticut  towns.  Here,  as  already 
indicated,  democracy  underwent  a  further  development,  church 
membership  not  being  required  for  the  exercise  of  the  right  of 
suffrage.  This  is  the  first  appearance  in  New  England  of  the 
cleavage  between  Church  and  State,  and  it  was  the  entering  of 
the  wedge  which,  working  slowly  but  with  irresistible  force, 
was  ultimately  to  drive  out  ecclesiastical  domination  from  state 
and  from  public  education. 

The  educational  developments  of  Connecticut  were  necessarily 
at  first  identified  with  those  of  Massachusetts,  and  even  after 
the  separation,  the  younger  colony  was  influenced  by  the  older. 
The  demand  of  Luther  and  Calvin  for  an  education  which  should 
fit  men  to  live  in  the  state,  as  well  as  to  die  and  leave  it,  has 
already  been  noted.  In  New  England  the  value  of  education 
from  a  civil  standpoint  was  early  emphasized  and  developed 
rapidly.  The  unanimity  of  the  theological  belief  of  the  New 
England  colonists  and  the  nature  of  that  belief  were  favorable 
to  educational  unity  and  educational  progress.  They  had 
learned  from  hard  experience  that  there  could  be  no  religious 
liberty  without  civil  freedom.     The  town  meeting  was  primarily 

33 


34  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

a  meeting  of  the  body  politic  for  the  regulation  of  civil  affairs. 
The  ecclesiastical  proceedings  were  a  portion  of  the  lay  business 
of  the  town  meeting  and  not  vice  versa.  The  educational 
matters  which  were  considered  in  the  town  meeting  became 
therefore  necessarily  a  civil,  not  an  ecclesiastical  function.^ 
The  common  school  of  New  England  was  in  no  sense  a  child  of 
the  Church;  it  was  a  child  of  the  people.^  The  civil  interest 
was  prominent  from  the  outset,  and  in  the  earliest  legislation 
of  both  colonies  the  "learning  and  labor"  that  were  profitable 
to  the  Commonwealth,  and  a  "knowledge  of  the  capital  laws" 
were  prime  considerations. 

About  the  time  that  the  Watertown  and  Dorchester  congre- 
gations were  preparing  to  go  out  into  the  wilderness  and  lay  the 
foundations  of  their  new  settlements,  in  the  spring  of  1635, 
Boston  was  taking  steps  toward  the  establishment  of  her  first 
school,  the  famous  Boston  Latin  School.  In  this,  as  in  similar 
foundations  in  New  England,  the  colonists  were  transplanting 
to  their  new  homes  the  familiar  ideals  of  the  mother  country. 
This  school  was  therefore  probably  designed  by  its  founders  as 
a  "public"  or  "free"  school  intended  primarily  to  give  instruction 
in  the  classical  languages  to  all  classes  of  children;  but,  as  in 
similar  schools  of  England,  providing  necessarily  also  some 
elementary  education.^  The  import  of  the  terms  "public" 
and  "free"  school  has  already  been  considered.  At  about  this 
time,  or  within  a  few  years  most  of  the  Massachusetts  towns 
had  taken  similar  steps.  The  support  of  the  schools  was  pro- 
vided for  by  grants  of  land,  by  gifts  or  bequests  of  individuals, 
by  allowances  made  out  of  the  common  stock  of  the  town,  by 
rates  of  those  not  contributing,  by  tuition  fees  paid  by  parents, 
or  by  various  combinations  of  these.^  There  was  at  first  no 
uniformity  in  support;  and  apparently  no  direct  taxation;  nor 
were  tuition  fees  at  first  commonly  employed.^    The  claim  has 

*  U.  S.  Bureau  of    Education,  Report  of  Commissioner,  1894-95,  Vol.  I, 

p.  1458. 

2  Ibid.,  p.  1523. 

'  U.  S.  Bureau  of   Education,  Report  of  Commissioner,  1896-97,  Vol.  II, 
pp.  1 166,  67. 

*  U.  S.  Bureau  of   Education,  Report  of  Commissioner,  1896-97,  Vol.  II, 
p.  1 168. 

^  Martin:  Evolution  of  the  Massachusetts  Public  School  System,  pp.  48,  49. 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  35 

been  made  for  Dorchester  that  there  was  made  the  first  provis- 
ion in  the  world  for  a  free  school  supported  by  a  direct  tax  on  the 
inhabitants.  This  was  in  1639.^  While  the  towns  generally- 
maintained  an  oversight  of  the  schools,  in  Dorchester  in  1645 
at  a  town  meeting  a  school  committee  was  appointed,  consisting 
of  three  members,  who  were  termed  "wardens"  or  "overseers 
of  the  school."  This  is  believed  to  have  been  the  first  school 
committee  appointed  by  any  municipality  in  this  country .^ 
While  formerly  it  was  supposed  that  corporate  provision  was 
made  at  first  only  for  "grammar,"  i.  e.,  Latin  schools,  it  has 
recently  become  evident  that  as  in  Boston,  so  in  other  places, 
elementary  education  was  generally  maintained  by  the  towns 
in  one  way  or  another.  Theoretically  children  were  supposed 
to  have  mastered  the  art  of  reading  before  entering  the  grammar 
school,  yet  this  was  not  always  the  case,  and  in  various  ways 
provision  was  made  for  elementary  instruction  either  in  the 
grammar  school  or  in  another  school  provided  for  that  purpose. 
The  "dame  school"  of  England  was  reproduced  in  the  younger 
country  in  answer  to  the  necessities  of  the  situation.^  Harvard 
College  founded  in  1636  by  a  vote  of  the  Court  is  famous  be- 
cause it  is  said  to  be  the  first  instance  in  which  the  people, 
acting  through  a  representative  body,  ever  gave  their  money 
to  found  a  place  of  education.^  The  system  was  therefore  com- 
plete, elementary,  secondary  and  higher  education  being  ac- 
cessible in  due  order  within  six  years  of  the  foundation  of  the 
settlement  in  at  least  one  town,  and  opportunity  for  the  first 
two  forms  within  a  few  years  in  others. 

The  law  of  1642  of  the  Massachusetts  colony  is  famous  and  has 
been  often  quoted.^  It  recognized  the  responsibility  of  the  state 
in  respect  of  every  member  of  the  same,  the  duty  of  parents 
and  employers  toward  minors,  and  the  right  of  the  state  to  add 
the  civil  compulsion  to  the  moral  obligation  of  parents  and  guard- 
ians. It  emphasized  the  necessity  of  intelligence  and  of  skill 
in  industry  for  the  moral  and  religious,  as  well  as  for  the  material 

*  U.  S.  Bureau  of  Education,  Report  of  Commissioner,  1896-97,  Vol.  II, 
p.  1 1 70.     Note  5. 

2  Ibid.,  p.  1 172. 

'  Martin:  Op.  cit.,  pp.  53,  54. 

*  Boone :  Education  in  the  United  States,  p.  20.     Note. 
^  Clews:  Op.  cit.,  pp.  59,  60. 


36  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

advancement  of  the  commonwealth.  Schools,  however,  were  not 
established  under  this  enactment.  The  law  of  1647  laid  the  foun- 
dation of  subsequent  educational  legislation  in  New  England.  It 
added  to  the  previous  legislation  the  significant  provision  for  ele- 
mentary and  grammar  schools  to  be  set  up  in  every  township  re- 
spectively which  had  increased  to  the  number  of  fifty  and  one 
hundred  families,  the  wages  of  schoolmasters  to  be  paid  either  by 
the  parents  or  masters,  or  by  the  inhabitants  in  general,  with 
a  penalty  for  neglect  of  the  law.^  This  has  been  called  the  first 
distinctly  civil  act  in  respect  of  school  legislation  in  the  history  of 
modern  Christendom.^  In  laying  these  educational  foundations 
New  England  was  carrying  out  the  ideals  of  the  Renaissance- 
Reformation  age  in  the  mother  country.  The  awakened  re- 
ligious spirit  was  associated  with  the  zeal  for  learning,  especially 
such  as  would  reveal  the  "true  sense  and  meaning  of  the  original 
tongues."^  The  clergyman  was  esteemed  in  New  England  not 
only  by  reason  of  his  religious  function,  but  also  and  quite  as 
fully  because  of  his  command  of  learning.  Because  of  the  new 
civil  importance  of  both  religion  and  learning,  the  latter  came 
as  the  years  passed  on,  to  occupy  a  unique  place  of  importance 
and  dignity  in  the  commonwealth,  overshadowing  even  the 
religious  interest. 

The  law  of  1647  was  carried  over  into  the  first  Connecticut 
law  concerning  education  in  the  code  of  1650.  To  the  educational 
beginnings  of  that  colony  consideration  must  now  be  given. 

The  settlers  of  the  Connecticut  towns  had  the  intense  religious 
convictions  of  the  Massachusetts  colonists,  the  same  zeal  in 
behalf  of  learning,  and  a  more  thorough-going  belief  in  democracy. 
Practice  in  education  preceded  legislation,  and  before  any  pro- 
vision was  made  by  law  for  the  regulation  and  support  of  schools, 
the  ministers  and  magistrates  are  said  to  have  made  a  plea  in 
town  meeting  and  among  the  families  that  an  allowance  should 
be  made  out  of  the  common  stock  of  the  town  for  the  support  of 
a  common  school,  and  that  parents  of  all  classes  should  send 
their  children  to  the  same  school.^     "The  outlines  and  most  of 

'  Clews:  Op.  cit.,  pp.  60,  62. 
2  Brown:  Op.  cit.,  pp.  65,  66. 

'  U.  S.  Bureau  of  Education,  Report  of  Commissioner,  1893-94,  Vol.  I, 
p.  658. 

*  Barnard:  American  Journal  of  Education,  Vol.  IV,  p.  658. 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  37 

the  essential  features  of  the  present  system  of  common  schools 
will  be  found  in  the  practice  of  the  first  settlers  of  the  several 
towns  which  composed  the  two  original  colonies  of  Connecticut 
and  New  Haven  before  any  general  law  was  made  for  the  reg- 
ulation and  support  of  schools  or  the  bringing  up  of  children."^ 
In  both  colonies  there  is  some  evidence  of  the  existence  of  schools 
in  1639.^  New  Haven  records  show  that  in  1641  the  court 
noted  that  "a  free  school  shall  be  set  up  in  the  town, "  the  pastor 
and  magistrates  to  consider  what  yearly  allowance  should  be 
given  to  it  out  of  the  common  stock  of  the  town.^  In  1644  New 
Haven  established  a  public  grammar,  or  "free"  school  to  train 
the  youth  for  public  service  in  church  and  commonwealth,  and 
as  before,  the  magistrates  with  the  teaching  elders  were  "en- 
treated to  consider  .  .  .  what  allowance  may  be  made  for  the 
schoolmaster's  care  and  pains,  which  shall  be  paid  out  of  the 
town's  stock.  "^  The  early  records  of  Hartford  are  lost,  but 
in  1642  the  voters  appropriated  thifty  pounds  a  year  to  the 
town  school,^  and  six  years  later  a  schoolhouse  was  ordered  to  be 
built,  not  to  be  devoted  to  any  other  use  or  employment.^  It 
is  believed  that  all  of  the  original  settlements  had  within  twenty 
years  established  schools.'^  The  mode  of  support  in  Hartford 
was  adopted  by  the  other  Connecticut  towns,  and  was  partly  a 
charge  on  the  general  funds  or  property  of  the  town,  and  partly 
by  a  rate  bill  or  tuition,  paid  by  the  parents  or  guardians  of 
children  attending  school,  "paying  alike  to  the  head."^  The 
poor  were  taught  free  of  charge.^  The  General  Court  of  Hart- 
ford made  provision  in  1644  for  an  annual  collection  in  every 
town  in  the  jurisdiction  for  the  maintenance  of  scholars  at  Har- 
vard College.^"^    The  New  Haven  Court  made  similar  provision 

1  Ibid.,  p.  657. 

2  Brown:  Op.  cit.,  p.  45. 

•  U.  S.  Bureau  of  Education,  Report  of  Commissioner,  1896-97,  Vol.  II, 
p.  1 176. 

•  Barnard:  Op.  cit.,  Vol.  IV,  p.  662. 
6  Ibid.,  p.  658. 

•  U.  S.  Bureau  of  Education,  Circular  of  Information  No.  2, 1893.     Steiner: 
The  History  of  Education  in  Connecticut,  p.  16. 

'  Ibid.,  pp.  16,  17. 

8  Barnard:  Op.  cit..  Vol.  IV,  p.  659. 

•  U.  S.  Bureau   of  Education,  Report  of  Commissioner,  1896-97,  Vol.  II, 
p.  1 176. 

1°  Clews:  Op.  cit.,  p.  73. 


38  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

and  renewed  the  vote  from  year  to  year.^  The  records  of  New- 
Haven  from  1 64 1  to  1660  are  full  of  entries  respecting  appro- 
priations of  money  to  teachers  and  reports  of  committees  on 
schools;  and  on  these  committees  the  governor,  minister,  magis- 
trates or  deputies  were  always  placed.  Barnard  says  that  before 
New  Haven  ceased  to  be  an  independent  colony  a  system  of 
public  education  had  been  established  through  the  influence  of 
Theophilus  Eaton  and  John  Davenport,  which  was  without  a 
parallel  at  that  time  in  any  part  of  the  world,  and  not  surpassed 
in  its  universal  application  to  all  classes,  rich  and  poor,  in  any 
subsequent  period  in  the  history  of  the  state.^ 

Connecticut  took  steps  in  1646  to  codify  her  laws,  and  ap- 
pointed Roger  Ludlow  who  had  held  various  offices  in  the  colony, 
and  who  had  probably  assisted  in  framing  the  educational  laws 
of  Massachusetts,  to  compile  a  code  of  laws.^  This  was  com- 
pleted in  1650,  and  was  a  codification  of  all  the  laws  passed  by 
the  general  court  together  with  local  practices  which  had  grown 
up  in  the  towns  which  seemed  worthy  of  adoption  by  the  whole 
colony.  Many  provisions  were  borrowed  from  the  Massachu- 
setts laws.  Under  the  title  "children,"  it  was  required  that 
children  and  apprentices  should  be  taught  to  read  EngUsh  and 
understand  the  capital  laws,  and  a  penalty  was  attached  to  the 
neglect  of  the  law.  Children  and  servants  were  to  be  taught  and 
catechized  in  the  grounds  and  principles  of  religion,  and  also 
to  be  brought  up  in  some  honest  calling  or  labor  if  they  could 
not  be  educated  for  higher  employments.  The  selectmen  were 
empowered  to  remove  minors  from  the  care  of  such  parents  and 
masters  as  were  negligent  of  the  law,  and  to  place  them  with 
suitable  masters,  boys  until  the  age  of  twenty-one,  and  girls  to 
eighteen.  Under  "Schools"  it  was  enacted  that  in  order  to 
preserve  learning  in  the  Church  and  Commonwealth  every 
town  of  fifty  householders  should  establish  an  elementary  school, 
the  teacher  to  be  paid  either  by  the  parents  and  masters  or  by 
the  town,  and  every  town  of  one  hundred  householders,  a  gram- 
mar school  to  prepare  youth  for  the  university.  A  penalty  was 
attached  to  the  neglect  of  the  law.^     Provision  was  also  made  for 

1  Barnard:  Op.  cit.,  Vol.  IV,  p.  662. 
«  Op.  cit.,  Vol.  IV,  p.  665. 

•  Clews:  Op.  cit.,  p.  73.     Note. 

*  Ibid.,  pp.  74-76. 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  39 

the  religious  instruction  of  the  Indians.^  With  slight  modifi- 
cation these  laws  remained  on  the  statute  books  of  the  state 
until  almost  the  close  of  the  eighteenth  century .^  New  Haven 
had  a  code  of  laws  drawn  up  about  1648  or  1649,  revised  in 
1655,  and  published  in  1656,  which  contained  an  educational 
provision  similar  to  that  of  Connecticut.^  With  the  union  of  the 
two  colonies  in  1655,  the  laws  of  the  latter  colony  superseded 
those  of  the  former.^  The  school  code  was  repeatedly  revised 
and  during  the  eighteenth  century  legislation  was  frequent,  much 
of  it  looking  toward  the  increase  in  the  efficiency  of  the  schools 
and  their  better  and  more  effective  administration.  In  17 12  the 
colony  took  the  first  steps  backward  in  the  administration  of  her 
schools  by  withdrawing  their  direction  from  the  towns  and  plac- 
ing it  in  the  hands  of  the  newly  created  "parishes."^  The 
practical  effects  of  this  retrograde  movement,  however,  were  at 
first  slight  and  of  slow  development.  The  inner  workings  of 
the  school  "society"  and  the  differences  representing  this 
transition  stage  are  an  open  question.^  As  long  as  the  people 
were  of  the  same  mind  ecclesiastically,  the  school  was  managed 
by  the  same  group  of  persons  who  voted  in  town  and  "society" 
meetings  in  the  administration  of  their  respective  civil  and  re- 
ligious interests.  In  spite  of  the  "steady  tramp  of  the  Church 
and  clergy"^  as  they  sought  to  obtain  control  of  popular  educa- 
tion and  of  public  funds  appropriated  for  educational  purposes, 
the  climax  of  the  slowly  growing  difficulties  between  Church 
and  civil  society,  sure  to  follow,  was  not  reached  until  the  acts 
of  1795  and  1798,  when  the  whole  system  was  revolutionized, 
and  the  ecclesiastical  influence  and  power  in  educational  mat- 
ters were   confirmed.^    The  authority  of   the   towns,  the  old- 

• 

1  Barnard:  Op.  cit.,  Vol.  IV,  pp.  665,  667. 

*  U.  S.  Bureau  of  Education,  Report  of  Commissioner,  1896-97,  Vol.  II, 
p.  1 1 76. 

'  Barnard:  Op.  cit.,  Vol.  IV,  p.  664. 

*  Ibid.,  p.  665. 

^  Steiner:  Op.  cit.,  p.  30. 

*  U.  S.  Bureau  of  Education,  Report  of  Commissioner,  1896-97,^  Vol.  I, 

PP-  773.  774- 

'  U.  S.  Bureau  of  Education,  Report  of  Commissioner,  1894-95,  Vol.  II, 

p.  1580. 

'  Steiner:  Op.  cit.,  p.  35. 


40  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

time  agencies  in  education,  had  disappeared  and  the  "school 
societies"  had  taken  their  place.  Together  with  the  change  in 
the  mode  of  supporting  the  schools  by  the  great  increase  at  this 
time  in  the  public  funds  largely  from  the  sale  of  the  Western 
Reserve  lands  in  Ohio,  and  by  the  removal  of  the  obligation  of 
raising  money  by  taxation,  the  result  was  ultimately  disastrous 
to  the  educational  system  of  the  state.^  During  the  eighteenth 
century,  however,  the  educational  standards  were  maintained; 
and  up  to  1798  the  law  enforced  the  keeping  of  schools  in  towns 
or  societies  of  more  than  seventy  families  for  eleven  months  of  the 
year,  and  in  those  of  less  than  seventy  for  at  least  one  half  of  the 
year.  It  also  enforced  the  keeping  of  a  grammar  school  in  the 
head  town  of  the  several  counties.  It  imposed  a  tax  for  the  support 
of  schools  which  was  distributed  to  towns  or  societies  complying 
with  the  law.^  The  educational  system  of  Connecticut  until 
the  time  of  the  Revolution  has  been  described  as  "the  nearest 
approach  to  our  present  system  of  any  then  existing  in  the 
colonies."  At  this  time  illiteracy  was  practically  non-existent 
in  the  colony.^  Education  was  by  law  compulsory  and  the  law 
was  enforced.  Barnard  says  "While  the  course  of  instruction 
in  the  common  schools  prior  to  1800  was  limited  to  spelling,  read- 
ing, writing  and  the  elements  of  arithmetic,  these  studies  were 
pursued  by  all  the  people  of  the  State ;  so  that  it  was  rare  to  find 
a  native  of  Connecticut  *  who  could  not  read  the  holy  word  of  God 
and  the  good  laws  of  the  State.'  "  These  schools  such  as  they 
were,  were  the  main  reliance  of  the  whole  community  for  the 
above  studies.  There  were  but  few  private  schools,  except  to 
fit  young  men  for  college  or  carry  them  forward  in  the  higher 
branches  of  an  English  education."*  "In  no  part  of  the  world 
is  the  education  of  all  ranks  of  the  people  more  attended  to  than 
in  Connecticut,"  says  an  English  writer  in  1796.  "Almost  every 
town  in  the  State  is  divided  into  districts  and  each  district  has  a 
public  school  kept  in  it  a  greater  or  less  part  of  every  year. 
Somewhat  more  than  one  third  of  the  moneys  arising  from  a 

*  Barnard:  Op.  cit.,  Vol.  IV,  pp.  705,  706. 
2  Ibid.,  p.  709. 

^  U.  S.  Bureau  of  Education,  Report  of  Commissioner,   1894-95,  Vol.  II, 

p.  1578. 

*  Op.  cit.,  Vol.  IV,  p.  709. 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  41 

tax  on  the  polls  and  ratable  estate  of  the  inhabitants  is  appro- 
priated to  the  support  of  schools  in  the  several  towns,  for  the 
education  of  children  and  youth.  "^  The  schoolmaster  was 
esteemed  equally  with  the  clergyman  or  magistrate.  In  an 
old  bill  for  fitting  up  a  meeting-house  in  Windsor,  there  is  a 
separate  item  for  wainscoting  and  elevating  the  pews  which  were 
to  be  occupied  by  the  magistrates,  the  deacon's  family  and  the 
schoolmaster .2  The  teachers  of  the  district  schools  were  drawn 
from  a  superior  grade  of  the  people,  because  of  the  professional 
standard  and  the  honor  in  which  the  office  was  held.  This  is 
true  not  only  of  men,  but  also  of  women.'  College  and  academy 
students  recruited  the  ranks  of  the  teaching  body  and  this 
maintained  the  standards  of  the  school  and  the  dignity  of  the 
profession  in  the  state.  In  addition  to  these  in  some  smaller 
New  England  towns  it  was  the  custom  to  open  a  subscription 
school  for  three  months  in  the  autumn,  where  a  higher  grade 
of  studies,  including  the  classics,  could  be  pursued.  The  teach- 
ers were  college  graduates  of  the  preceding  summer,  or  students 
of  theological  schools.^  Thus  the  benefits  of  the  higher  education 
were  extended  in  the  community.  "No  State,"  says  Hinsdale, 
"has  a  more  honorable  educational  record,  taken  altogether, 
than  Connecticut.  No  other  of  the  old  states  can  show  such 
a  connected  series  of  public  and  private  transactions  relating 
to  schools  and  education  extending  from  the  foundation  of  the 
Commonwealth  down  to  the  opening  of  the  present  educational 
era,  some  fifty  or  sixty  years  ago."**  Moreover  here  were  laid 
the  foundations  not  only  "for  a  universal  education,  but  for  a 
practical  and  social  equality  which  has  never  been  surpassed  in 

^Barnard:  Op.  cit.,  Vol.  XXIV,  p.  144,  citing  "Extracts  from  Rev.  W. 
Winterbotham's  View  of  the   United  States  of  America,"   London,    1796. 

2  Barnard:  Op.  cit.,  Vol.  IV,  p.  659. 

'  Note:  There  is  some  reason  to  believe  that  girls  had  earlier  consideration 
in  Connecticut  than  elsewhere,  even  in  Massachusetts.  While  in  some  towns 
of  the  latter  colony  they  were  excluded  until  almost  the  close  of  the  eight- 
eenth century,  they  are  said  to  have  been  taught  in  the  public  schools  in  and 
around  Hartford  in  1770,  sitting  on  separate  benches,  but  not  in  separate 
classes.     Brown:  Op.  cit.,  pp.  251,  253. 

P-  1595. 

*  U.  S.  Bureau  of  Education,  Report  of  Commissioner,  1894-95,  Vol.  II, 

P-  1595- 

^  U.  S.  Bureau  of  Education,  Report  of  Commissioner,  1892-93,  Vol.  II, 

p.  1240. 


42  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

the  history  of  any  other  community.  The  people  of  Connecticut 
were  the  most  enlightened  of  all  the  Colonies  at  the  dawn  of  the 
American  independence."^ 

These  were  the  ideals  which  had  been  fostered  for  more  than 
a  hundred  years  in  the  home  state  when  the  Wyoming  settlers 
went  out  to  build  new  dwellings  in  the  Pennsylvania  wilderness ; 
this  was  the  educational  inheritance  which  they  carried  with 
them  and  endeavored  to  maintain  as  they  laid  the  foundations 
for  their  new  community,  for  its  civic,  religious  and  educational 
life. 

1  U.  S.  Bureau  of  Education,  Report  of  Commissioner,  1893-94,  Vol.  I, 
P-  659. 


CHAPTER  IV 

EDUCATION  IN  WYOMING 

The  Wyoming  settlers,  therefore,  brought  with  them  to 
Pennsylvania  the  results  of  more  than  a  hundred  years  of  educa- 
tional endeavor  for  the  Commonwealth,  and  an  established  con- 
viction of  the  value  to  the  state  of  the  common  school.  The 
first  steps  in  the  provision  for  religious  and  moral  care  of  the  new 
community  were  taken  by  the  action  of  the  Susquehanna  Com- 
pany at  Windham  on  April  17,  1763,  when  it  was  voted  that  a 
suitable  person  or  persons  should  be  procured  by  the  settlers  to 
carry  on  religious  instruction  and  worship .  This  general  provision 
for  religious  care  found  specific  expression  in  the  later  action  of 
the  Company  in  1768,  when  it  was  resolved  that  three  rights  or 
shares  in  each  of  the  five  townships  planned  should  be  appro- 
priated for  the  support  of  religion  and  education.^  All  the  towns 
settled  by  the  company  were  under  the  same  conditions  as  the 
first  five;  and  the  three  rights  or  shares  were  subsequently 
devoted  by  the  settlers  exclusively  to  school  purposes,^  The 
appropriation  of  several  thousand  acres  in  the  eastern  part  of 
the  state  for  the  use  of  the  Indian  school  maintained  by  Dr. 
Wheelock  has  been  previously  mentioned.^  The  offer  was  not 
accepted,  and  the  school  was  established  not  in  Pennsylvania, 
but  in  New  Hampshire  and  later  became  Dartmouth  College.^ 

The  educational  history  of  the  Wyoming  region  began  in 
1770,  when  the  Wilkes-Barre  town  plot  was  surveyed  and  lots 
were  drawn  by  the  proprietors  of  the  townships.^  The  will  of  the 
Susquehanna  Company  was  carried  out  by  the  setting  aside  of 
two  lots,  containing  about  four  hundred  acres  of  land,  for  the 
first  settled  minister  and  for  schools.     The  spirit  of  religious 

^  Supra,  p.  28. 

2  Report  of  the  Superintendent  of   Public  Instruction  in   Pennsylvania, 

1877,  P-  374- 
'  Supra,  p.  28. 

*  Dexter:  History  of  Education  in  the  United  States,  p.  265. 
^  Harvey:  Op.  cit.,  Vol.  II,  p.  653. 

43 


44  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

tolerance  was  shown  by  the  fact  that  when  it  appeared  that  a 
number  of  the  people  were  Baptists  (the  majority  being  Pres- 
byterians) ,  the  vote  was  rescinded  which  demanded  a  tax  from 
them,  and  an  arrangement  made  which  was  satisfactory  to  all, 
by  which  the  former  group  might  attend  the  ministrations  of  their 
own  denomination  in  Kingston.^  The  sum  of  money  promised 
to  the  pastor  was  then  raised  by  subscription. ^  It  is  evident  that 
the  Connecticut  settlers  were  here  laying  the  foundation  of 
the  modern  non-sectarian  public  school  system,  and  separating 
the  business  of  the  church  from  that  of  education;  and  in  this 
respect  they  were  taking  a  step  in  advance  of  their  home  colony. 
With  the  adoption  of  the  "Articles  of  Agreement"  by  the  Sus- 
quehanna Company  the  townships  began  the  direction  of  their 
local  affairs  through  their  chosen  representatives. 

At  a  town  meeting  in  Wilkes-Barre  in  1773  a  vote  was  passed 
to  raise  three  pence  on  the  pound  in  the  district  list  to  keep  a 
free  school  in  the  several  school  districts  of  the  town ;  and  a  sub- 
sequent meeting,  "specially  warned,"  adopted  measures  for  the 
keeping  open  of  free  schools,  one  in  the  upper  district  of  the  town, 
one  in  the  lower,  and  a  third  on  the  town  plot.^  At  a  town  meet- 
ing held  in  Kingston  the  same  year  three  persons  were  chosen  to 
divide  the  town  into  three  districts  for  the  keeping  of  schools.* 
Eight  town  meetings  were  held  in  1774  and  at  the  last  held  on 
December  6,  a  School  Committee  was  chosen,  consisting  of 
fifteen  persons  to  act  for  the  ensuing  year.^  This  body  so 
chosen  at  the  "town"  or  general  meeting  of  the  settlers  has  been 
regarded  as  a  sort  of  county  organization  whose  function  was 
to  co-operate  with  the  local  committee  of  the  various  town- 
ships.    It  has  been  inferred  that  the  action  taken  by  Wilkes- 

^  Miner:  Op.  cit.,  pp.  143,  144. 

2  Proceedings  and  Collections  of  the  Wyoming  Historical  Society,  Vol,  IV, 
p.  49. 

'  Miner:  Op.  cit.,  p.  144. 

Note:  The  survey  of  Wilkes-Barre  in  1770  established  what  is  known  as 
the  Town  Plot,  showing  a  division  of  lots  and  an  open  space  along  the  river  on 
which  the  lots  bounded.  This  is  the  earliest  authentic  evidence  of  an  inten- 
tion by  the  fitst  settlers  to  leave  an  open  space  in  front  of  the  town,  along  the 
river  for  public  uses.     Harvey:  Op.  cit..  Vol.  II,  map  p.  655. 

*  Report  of  State  Superintendent,  1877,  p.  377. 

^  Miner:  Op.  cit.,  p.  159  (quoting  the  "Westmoreland  Records"). 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  45 

Barre  was  duplicated  in  the  other  townships.  The  fragmentary 
records  which  have  been  preserved  and  collected  by  local  and 
county  historians  furnish  evidence  sufficient  to  support  this 
conclusion.  One  township  set  aside  land  for  church  and  school 
purposes.^  Another  voted  in  1 806  that  the  interest  of  the  public 
moneys  for  three  years  past  be  appropriated  to  schools.  Six 
trustees  were  appointed  to  divide  the  township  into  three  school 
districts,  a  census  of  the  school  population  in  each  division  was 
made,  and  schools  were  established  in  each  district. ^  Thus  into 
the  Wyoming  region  generally  was  introduced  and  maintained 
the  fundamental  principle  of  the  common  school  system,  educa- 
tion for  all  free  from  sectarian  bias,  schools  supported  by  a 
general  fund  or  tax,  or  both,  with  local  management  and  res- 
sponsibility.  It  was  the  first  appearance  on  Pennsylvania  soil 
of  the  system  of  public  education  of  which  today  our  state  is 
justly  proud.  It  established  the  modern  ideal  that  education  was 
not  a  charity,  nor  was  it  to  be  fostered  in  the  spirit  of  sectarian 
bias  or  denominational  coloring;  it  was  the  education  for  a 
democracy  through  the  medium  of  the  public  school.  With  the 
erection  of  Westmoreland  into  a  county  and  the  levying  of  state 
and  county  taxes,  an  attempt  was  made  to  open  and  support 
schools.  Throughout  the  proceedings  of  1777  education  en- 
gaged more  than  ordinary  attention.  In  spite  of  the  taxes  paid 
into  the  treasury  at  Hartford,  an  additional  tax  of  a  penny  in 
the  pound  was  paid  for  the  support  of  schools.  Each  township 
was  established  as  a  legal  school  district  with  power  to  rent  the 
lands  sequestered  by  the  Susquehanna  Company  for  the  use  of 
schools,  and  also  to  receive  of  the  School  Committee  appointed 
by  the  town  their  part  of  the  county  money  according  to  their 
respective  rates.  The  value  of  higher  education  was  not  for- 
gotten, for  it  was  entered  on  the  record  that  for  the  first  time 
during  the  year  a  student  had  been  sent  to  Yale.^  In  1778  came 
the  terrors  of  the  Wyoming  massacre,  but  educational  interests 
were  not  long  neglected,  for  in  1779  at  a  town  meeting  on  Dec- 
ember 6,  the  usual  officials  were  chosen,  including  a  School 
Committee.* 

*  Report  of  State  Superintendent,  1877,  p.  373. 

2  History  of  Luzerne,  Lackawanna  and  Wyoming  Counties,  p.  326. 
»  Miner:  Op.  cit.,  p.  197  (quoting  the  "Westmoreland  Records"). 

*  Ibid.,  p.  277. 


46  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

Since  the  records  of  actual  achievement  of  the  various  town- 
ships during  the  years  of  the  Connecticut  jurisdiction  and  after 
the  Trenton  Decree  are  so  scanty,  there  are  few  details  to  show 
what  was  accomplished  in  the  first  years  of  the  settlement  or 
in  the  early  portion  of  the  nineteenth  century  in  the  carrying  out 
of  the  educational  policies  which  were  so  wisely  and  energeti- 
cally planned  by  the  settlers  as  they  laid  the  foundations  of  their 
new  communities.  In  the  disasters  of  the  "Pennamite"  and 
Revolutionary  wars,  in  the  clash  of  authority  between  Con- 
necticut and  Pennsylvania,  in  the  hardships,  poverty,  factional 
feeling  and  legal  strife  which  were  their  lot,  the  plan  to  support 
free  public  schools  by  taxation  was  apparently  not  carried  to  a 
conclusion.  Miner  asserts  that  by  1775  schoolhouses  were 
erected  in  every  district.^  This  is  hardly  credible  in  the  existing 
state  of  affairs;  and  it  is  probably  truer,  as  has  been  elsewhere 
stated,  that  "few  or  no  buildings  were  erected  especially  for 
school  or  religious  purposes  until  after  the  Compromise  law  of 
1799  was  carried  into  effect,  and  the  settlers  quieted  in  their 
homes  and  property.  Schools,  however,  were  held  in  private 
houses,  in  barns,  in  structures  temporarily  fitted  up,  or  even 
outdoors,  before  schoolhouses  were  built;  and  at  no  time  was 
home  education  neglected,  even  after  the  building  of  schools.  "^ 
The  meager  and  uncertain  body  of  data  concerning  the  Wyoming 
schools  makes  all  attempt  at  historical  statement  of  early  schools 
and  teachers  unsatisfactory;  but  as  has  already  been  indicated, 
occasional  records  which  have  been  gathered  up,  together  with 
much  reminiscence  dating  back  often  to  a  period  before  the  open- 
ing of  the  nineteenth  century  show  that  the  plan  originally  proposed 
was  not  abandoned.  The  names  of  several  teachers  in  Wyoming 
previous  to  and  at  the  time  of  the  massacre  in  1778  have  been 
preserved.^  The  early  efforts  of  Wilkes-Barre  have  already  been 
described  in  connection  with  the  policies  of  the  Susquehanna 
Company.  The  exact  sequel  of  these  endeavors  seems  not  to 
be  known,  but  apparently  there  were  provisions  for  education, 
either  of  a  public  or  private  nature,  or  both.  At  other  points 
in  the  settlement,  schools  were  an  early  care.     In  Kingston  town- 

^  Op.  cit.,  p.  164. 

2  Report  of  State  Superintendent,  1877,  p.  377. 

3  Ibid.,  pp.  375,  376. 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  47 

ship  a  plot  of  ground  containing  ten  square  rods  was  leased  by 
one  of  the  citizens  for  school  purposes  on  April  14,  1796,  and  the 
school  was  opened  on  the  26th  of  the  month.  The  building  was 
erected  by  the  co-operation  of  a  group  of  interested  persons, 
each  one  bringing  a  share  of  materials  and  contributing  his  part 
to  the  labor,  which  was  therefore  promptly  completed.  The 
teacher  was  to  receive  for  a  term  of  twelve  weeks  the  sum  of 
thirty  Spanish  milled  dollars  and  to  board  around.^  The  names 
of  many  of  his  successors  have  been  preserved,  and  it  is  stated 
that  most  of  these  men  and  women  were  possessed  of  superior  abili- 
ties, and  were  of  high  standing  in  their  communities.  There 
were  among  them  men  who  were  judges  of  the  courts,  or  mem- 
bers of  the  legislature;  one  was  the  editor  of  a  newspaper  of 
recognized  authority.  An  early  teacher  in  Wilkes-Barre  was  a 
graduate  of  a  German  university .^  At  other  places  in  the  dis- 
trict, schools  are  said  to  have  been  erected  and  used  in  the  early 
years  of  the  nineteenth  century.^  William  L.  Horton  adver- 
tised in  1802  "a  School  is  just  opened  at  the  Lower  School 
House  in  Kingston  for  the  term  of  six  months.  Those  who 
may  see  fit  to  commit  their  children  to  the  care  of  the  subscriber 
may  depend  upon  their  being  instructed  in  the  best  manner 
with  respect  to  both  morals  and  education."^  Beside  the 
elementary  schools  the  academies  of  New  England  were  repro- 
duced in  Wyoming  by  the  founding  of  similar  institutions  for 
higher,  including  classical  education.  The  famous  Wilkes- 
Barre  Academy  was  opened  in  1804  and  incorporated  in  1807. 
Under  the  care  of  its  second  principal,  Garrick  Mallery,  sent 
from  Yale  in  response  to  the  request  of  the  trustees,  the  school 
acquired  a  reputation  for  its  thorough  classical  and  higher 
instruction,  and  many  students  came  from  a  distance  to  enjoy 
its  advantages.^  Kingston  had  an  academy  founded  in  1812,^ 
and  Plymouth  one  in  181 5.' 

Of   the   present   Wyoming   County    (formerly   a   portion   of 
Luzerne)  few  records  exist,  but  there  is  some  evidence  that  a 

1  Ibid.,  p.  378. 

2  History  of  Luzerne,  Lackawanna  and  Wyoming  Counties,  p.  200. 

3  Report  of  State  Superintendent,  1877,  p.  380. 

*  Luzerne  Federalist  and  Susquehanna  Intelligencer,  March  14,  1802. 
^  Report  of  State  Superintendent,  1877,  p.  387.     See  Appendix  B. 
«  Wyoming  Historical  Record,  Vol.  VI,  p.  174. 
7  Ibid.,  Vol.  X,  p.  160. 


48  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

school  was  held  as  early  as  1800,  that  the  first  schoolhouse  was 
built  in  1802,  and  that  in  several  townships  educational  facilities 
existed  during  the  first  and  second  decades  of  the  nineteenth 
century.^ 

Wayne  County  contained  the  site  of  the  first  Connecticut 
settlement  in  Pennsylvania.  It  was  not,  however,  of  permanent 
duration.  A  school  is  said  to  have  been  organized  in  1794  by 
the  later  settlers,  and  other  schools  and  teachers  are  mentioned 
in  1799,  1800  and  1801.  The  first  schoolhouse  is  said  to  have 
been  erected  in  1798.  In  1808  and  for  several  years  following, 
a  school  in  Salem  was  taught  by  the  Rev.  William  Woodbridge, 
author  of  a  well-known  geography.  He  gave  instruction  in 
mathematics  and  natural  science.^ 

In  Susquehanna  County,  also  formerly  a  part  of  Luzerne, 
records  of  schools  show  the  latter  to  have  been  established  from 
1794.  The  names  of  several  teachers  and  locations  of  schools 
have  been  recorded  and  others  doubtless  not  on  record  were 
maintained.  This  county,  too,  had  an  academy,  the  Susque- 
hanna Academy,  incorporated  in  18 16,  and  a  classical  school 
established  in  181 7  which  in  1830  was  incorporated  as  Franklin 
Academy,  and  a  third  in  Dundaff  established  in  1833.^ 

In  Bradford  County,  also  originally  a  part  of  Luzerne,  where 
were  numerous  New  Englanders,  a  similar  school  plan  arose. 
The  earliest  school  is  believed  to  have  been  conducted  about 
1788  or  1789  at  Athens,  which  was  the  oldest  township  in  the 
county,  and  recognized  with  the  "certified  townships"  by  the 
law  of  1799.  A  number  of  schools  were  in  existence  apparently 
by  the  close  of  the  first  decade  of  the  nineteenth  century,  and 
many  names  of  those  who  taught  are  on  record.  Bradford 
County  also  early  planned  an  academy.  In  1797  twenty-five 
of  the  leading  citizens  of  Athens  subscribed  to  a  fund  for  the 
erection  of  a  building  for  the  instruction  of  youth,  and  for  the 
occasional  uses  of  public  worship,  or  other  public  business. 
The  plan  moved  slowly  but  the  academy  was  incorporated  in 

1813.' 

^  Report  of  State  Superintendent,  1877,  p.  607,  611. 

*  Ibid.,  pp.  585,  586.  Cf.  Wright:  History  of  Plymouth,  p.  269.  See 
Appendix  C. 

»  Ibid.,  pp.  521,  525. 

*  Ibid.,  pp.  82-84. 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  49 

Lackawanna  County,  also  formerly  a  part  of  Luzerne,  with  its 
present  capital  city  of  Scranton,  is  recorded  as  having  been  the 
recipient  in  18 12,  for  educational  purposes,  of  a  large  tract  of 
land  originally  belonging  to  the  proprietors  of  Providence  town- 
ship. This  land  later  became  the  subject  of  litigation  and  the 
financial  returns  were  therefore  not  ultimately  large.^  Its 
existence,  however,  is  evidence  that  the  same  principle  was  ap- 
plied here  as  elsewhere.  Similarly  with  other  localities  in  which 
these  settlers  were  found,  the  school  for  the  people,  often  re- 
sembling in  its  form  the  "neighborhood  school,"  followed  their 
footsteps.  It  is  said,  moreover,  that  there  is  no  record  of  schools 
in  Wyoming  founded  by  the  Pennsylvania  claimants,^  and  it  is 
probable  that  there  were  no  schools  founded  and  supported  by 
churches. 

The  data  above  quoted  are  given  by  way  of  illustration  of  the 
general  situation.  The  Report  of  the  Superintendent  of  Public 
Instruction  in  Pennsylvania  for  1877  contains  numerous  similar 
statements,  representing  the  known  or  probable  school  activities 
of  the  various  localities  of  this  region.  County  and  local  his- 
torians have  collected  further  data.  Founded  often  on  reminis- 
cence and  not  on  documentary  evidence,  the  reliability  of  these 
from  the  historical  point  of  view  may  be  questioned;  but  it  is 
impossible  to  avoid  the  conclusion  that  the  spirit  of  the  pioneers 
was  maintained,  and  that  their  achievement  was  effective  in 
proportion  to  their  means  and  circumstances.  Whatever  lapse 
there  may  be  in  records,  and  whatever  failure  to  carry  out  the 
plan  so  boldly  inaugurated  by  the  early  settlers,  it  remains  true 
that  education  was  almost  their  first  consideration.  A  study  of 
the  Report  of  1877  indicates  that  in  all  the  counties  representing 
the  New  England  settlements  schools  had  been  organized  early 
in  the  nineteenth  century,  or  before,  and  that  they  were  of  a 
character  and  standard  resembling  the  schools  of  the  mother 
state  at  the  time.  One  writer  says:  "Whenever  the  forty 
families  considered  requisite  for  the  occupation  of  a  township 
were  enlisted,  their  qualities,  occupation  and  talents  enumerated, 
the  minister  and  school  teacher  were  estimated  as  among  the 
indispensables.     Therefore  schools  were  never  neglected,   and 

1  History  of  Luzerne,  Lackawanna  and  Wyoming  Counties,  p.  400. 
*  Report  of  State  Superintendent,  1877,  p.  377. 


50  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

books  and  paper  were  brought  from  the  home  colony.  "^  Another, 
a  woman  who  had  been  educated  in  the  pioneer  schools,  and  who 
had  taught  in  them  for  nearly  fifty  years  wrote:  "Our  ancestors, 
coming  from  New  England,  principally  from  Connecticut  and 
Massachusetts,  and  being  well  informed,  intelligent  and  practi- 
cal men  and  women,  brought  with  them  people  capable  of  use- 
fulness in  all  the  requirements  of  an  early,  progressive  and  per- 
manent colonial  settlement.  They  were  of  the  best,  most 
learned  and  influential  families  of  their  several  New  England 
colonies.  Education  was  ever  considered  by  them  the  basis 
of  prosperity,  independence  and  happiness.  "^  As  education 
according  to  the  standard  of  those  days  was  general  in  the  home 
state,  many  families  of  those  who  came  had  sons  and  daughters 
who  were  qualified  to  teach.  The  social  status  of  the  teacher  in 
the  community  was  high,  in  accordance  with  the  New  England 
tradition  of  respect  for  that  profession.  Teachers  were  not 
infrequently  college  graduates,  or  students  or  graduates  of  the 
academies  which  had  begun  at  that  time  to  flourish  at  home. 
True  to  the  Connecticut  tradition,  as  soon  as  possible  the  people 
endeavored  to  secure  good  schoolhouses,  not  sparing  expense, 
in  proportion  to  their  means,  in  the  building  and  equipment 
of  the  structures  which  served  for  the  education  of  their  children, 
for  places  of  religious  worship,  and  often  also  for  the  adminis- 
tration of  justice  or  other  purposes  of  the  community  life.^ 
It  is  significant  of  their  attitude  that  the  evidence  points  to  the 
fact  that  schoolhouses  were  promptly  built  and  used  for  religious 
services  by  the  various  denominations  in  common.  The  building 
of  churches  in  most  localities  seems  to  have  followed  rather 
slowly.'*  The  first  schools  were  built,  like  the  first  homes,  of 
logs,  but  in  many  of  the  school  districts  frame  buildings  are  said 
to  have  existed  for  some  years  prior  to  1820.^ 

1  Wyoming  Historical  Record,  Vol.  Ill,  p.  191. 

2  Ibid.,  Vol.  V,  pp.  I,  3. 

'  Proceedings  and  Collections  of  the  Wyoming  Historical  and  Geological 
Society,  Vol.  VI,  p.  172. 

*  Note:  In  Wilkes-Barre  a  house  of  worship  is  said  to  have  been  built 
before  1778,  and  services  held  when  war  was  not  being  waged.  This  was 
destroyed  in  the  Wyoming  massacre,  and  services  were  then  held  in  the 
schoolhouses,  of  which  there  were  several,  and  at  the  homes.  Proceedings 
and  Collections  of  the  Wyoming  Historical  Society,  Vol.  IV,  p.  52. 

^  Wyoming  Historical  Record,  Vol.  V,  pp.  1-3. 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  51 

The  Wyoming  teacher  above  quoted  states  that  the  school 
building  of  the  period  which  forms  her  recollection  was  a  frame 
structure,  quite  old  and  weather-beaten.  It  was  about  twenty- 
five  feet  square,  lined,  ceiled  and  seated  with  planed  boards  of 
white  pine,  with  pine  floor  unpainted,  as  were  also  the  weather- 
boards of  the  other  coating.  It  was  lighted  by  four  twelve- 
pane  windows  of  eight-by-ten  glass.  It  was  heated  by  a  wood 
stove,  the  fuel  supplied  by  the  patrons  of  the  school  district.^ 

The  income  from  the  land  set  apart  for  the  maintenance  of 
schools  provided  the  building  and  equipment.  This  was  not 
always  the  case,  however,  for  schoolhouses  were  sometimes 
built,  as  already  noted,  by  the  co-operation  of  interested  patrons 
of  a  district.  Sometimes  under  the  direction  of  the  township 
school  committee  a  meeting  of  subscribers  toward  the  erection 
of  a  schoolhouse  was  called.  This  took  place  in  Pitts  ton  in 
1 8 10,  when  such  a  meeting  of  subscribers  for  building  a  school 
was  held.  A  committee  of  three  was  appointed  and  authorized 
to  obtain  a  deed  or  lease  of  a  plot  of  ground,  and  to  contract 
with  a  carpenter  for  the  work.  In  accordance  with  the  above, 
public  notice  was  given  of  the  letting  of  the  contract  to  the 
lowest  bidder  for  a  building  one  story  high  with  two  chimneys. 
The  contract  was  awarded  for  two  hundred  and  fifteen  dollars. 
By  1 812  the  school  was  completed,  and  used  for  school  purposes, 
elections  and  other  public  business.^  The  School  Committee 
employed  teachers  and  exercised  a  general  supervision.  The 
salaries  were  frequently  paid  in  whole  or  part  by  the  patrons  in 
proportion  to  the  number  of  days  they  had  sent  their  children  to 
school.  A  "rate-bill"  was  made  out  by  the  teacher  and  handed 
to  the  Committee,  who  collected  [the  amounts.^  In  this 
method  the  people  were  resorting  to  the  well-known  practice  of 
New  England,  in  which  the  school  was  supported  by  the  joint 
contributions  of  the  town  and  the  parents.  Often,  doubtless, 
the  method  of  support  was  simply  that  of  the  subscription  or 
neighborhood  school.  Mention  has  been  made  of  fuel  contrib- 
uted  by   parents.      In   respect  of    the   education   of  children 

1  Ibid.,  VoL  V,  pp.  1-3. 

2  Volume  of  Newspaper  Clippings  of  Luzerne  County,  p.  52  (in  the  Penn- 
sylvania Historical  Society). 

'  Wickersham:  Op.  cit.,  p.  77. 


52  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

whose  parents  were  not  able  to  pay,  it  is  to  be  remembered  that 
few,  if  any,  were  wealthy,  and  all  were  socially  of  the  same 
status.  From  the  earliest  days  the  practice  of  the  home  state 
had  accorded  free  education  to  those  unable  to  pay  for  it;  and 
pioneers  are  not  less  generous  than  other  people,  but  rather 
more  so,  owing  to  the  conditions  of  their  life.  The  law  of  1809 
providing  for  the  education  of  the  poor  will  be  referred  to  later. 

The  salaries  paid  to  teachers  were  meager  even  for  those 
days,  and  the  practice  familiar  in  New  England  and  elsewhere 
in  the  colonial  communities  of  "boarding  around"  supplemented 
the  teacher's  income.^  A  local  historian  is  authority  for  the 
statement  that  the  contract  made  by  the  teacher  with  his  em- 
ployers included  a  monthly  allowance,  with  board  and  lodging, 
and  occasionally  a  confidential  arrangement  was  made  by  which 
he  was  to  be  relieved  from  sojourning  with  certain  families.^ 
Teachers  worked  at  other  occupations,  such  as  farming,  when 
schools  were  not  in  session.^  In  the  carrying  out  of  the  action 
of  the  Susquehanna  Company  the  teacher  did  not,  like  the 
minister,  have  land  set  apart  for  his  use. 

Schools  were  held  winter  and  summer,  men  teaching  often 
during  the  former  session  and  women  during  the  latter.  Boys 
went  to  school  in  winter  and  girls  in  summer;  even  in  the  latter 
season  the  smaller  children  chiefly  attended  the  elementary 
schools,  the  older  girls  being  occupied  at  home.  Customs  grew  out 
of  the  requirements  of  life,  and  were  similar  to  those  of  the  home 
state.  There  is  no  reason  to  suppose  that  girls  and  boys  were 
not  taught  together  whenever  it  was  convenient  since  girls  were 
more  tolerantly  viewed  at  an  early  date  in  some  parts  of  Con- 
necticut than  elsewhere.* 

The  curriculum  of  the  elementary  school  of  Connecticut  during 
this  period  was  a  limited  one.  A  letter  written  to  Henry  Bar- 
nard by  President  Humphrey,  of  Amherst  College  concerning 
the  schools  of  the  state  between  1790  and  1800  contains  the 

'  Note:  Men  teachers  apparently  received  about  ten  or  twelve  dollars  a 
month  and  board,  and  women  one  dollar,  more  or  less,  with  board.  (See 
Report  of  State  Superintendent,  1877.) 

2  Wright:  Historical  Sketches  of  Plymouth,  p.  280. 

'  Wyoming  Historical  Record,  Vol.  X,  pp.  160,  184. 

*  Supra,  p.  41. 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  53 

following:  "Our  school  books  were  the  Bible  and  Webster's 
Spelling  Book ;  one  or  two  others  were  found  in  some  schools  for 
the  reading  classes.  Grammar  was  hardly  taught  at  all  in  any 
of  them,  and  that  little  was  confined  almost  entirely  to  com- 
mitting and  reciting  rules.  Parsing  was  one  of  the  occult 
sciences  of  my  day;  we  had  some  few  lessons  in  geography  by 
question  and  answer,  but  no  maps  nor  globes ;  as  for  blackboards, 
such  a  thing  was  not  thought  of  until  long  after.  Children's 
reading  and  picture  books  we  had  none ;  the  fables  in  Webster's 
spelling  book  came  nearest  to  them.  Arithmetic  was  hardly 
taught  at  all  in  the  day  schools.  As  a  substitute  there  were 
some  evening  schools  in  most  of  the  districts."^  This  repre- 
sents the  average  facilities  of  the  schools  at  about  the  period 
in  which  the  Pennsylvania  settlements  were  made  and  enlarged ; 
and  it  is  therefore,  a  general  statement  of  the  amount  and  kind 
of  elementary  education,  more  or  less,  to  which  the  settlers 
had  had  access.  It  represents  the  standard  toward  which  they 
would  aim,  if  not  one  which,  meager  as  it  is,  was  in  all  cases 
attained.  The  Wyoming  teacher  quoted  above  (speaking  of  the 
early  part  of  the  nineteenth  century)  says  "all  were  taught 
spelling,  reading  and  writing.  Grammar  and  history  were 
taught  to  any  who  wished  to  study  them,  or  who  were  advanced 
in  the  elementary  branches.  Webster's  Spelling  Book  and  the 
Dictionary  were  used;  the  New  England  Primer,  the  English 
Reader,  Columbian  Orator  and  American  Preceptor  were  used 
as  reading  books.  Daboll's,  Bennett's  and  Pike's  arithmetics 
were  used.  Lindley  Murray's  Grammar  was  generally  in  use 
until  superseded  by  Kirkham's  about  i835."2  A  historian  of 
Wayne  County  mentions  in  addition  to  some  of  the  above, 
Webster's  Elements  of  Useful  Knowledge,  The  Second  and 
Third  Parts,  Woodbridge's  and  Morse's  geographies.^  Most  of 
the  above  mentioned  text-books  are  of  New  England,  many 
of  them  of  Connecticut  origin.  Daboll,  author  of  the  well- 
known  arithmetic,  was  born  in  Connecticut,  and  his  book  for 
years  held  a  prominent  place.  Caleb  Bingham,  author  of  "The 
Columbian  Orator"  and  "The  American  Preceptor,"  was  born 

1  Clark:  Op.  cit.,  pp.  218,  219. 

2  Wyoming  Historical  Record,  Vol.  V,  pp.  1-3. 

3  Goodrich:  History  of  Wayne  County,  pp.  393,  394. 


54  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

in  the  same  state.  Noah  Webster  was  born  in  Hartford,  and 
Jedediah  Morse,  author  of  the  first  geography  published  in 
America,  was  a  native  of  Windham  County,  Connecticut.  The 
Reverend  WilHam  Woodbridge,  author  of  a  well-known  geo- 
graphy and  for  several  years  a  teacher  in  Salem,  Wayne  County, 
Pennsylvania,  as  above  mentioned,  and  in  Wilkes-Barre  was  a 
native  of  Massachusetts.  Pike's  arithmetic  was  published  in 
Newburyport,  Massachusetts,  in  1788.  The  author  was  a  gradu- 
ate of  Harvard  College.  A  review  of  these  titles  representing  the 
subjects  taught  and  the  books  used  in  the  Wyoming  schools 
shows  that  the  influence  of  the  mother  state  was  strong  in  the 
younger  settlement.  The  list  of  subjects  represents,  no  doubt 
the  maximum  efficiency  of  the  Wyoming  schools  in  the  early 
years  of  the  nineteenth  century,  as  well  as  the  course  of  study 
of  private  schools  and  academies,  rather  than  that  of  the  com- 
mon schools  of  the  elementary  grade.  But  it  was,  after  all,  the 
teacher  who  in  those  days  made  his  school  and  shaped  the  course 
of  study  according  to  his  own  equipment,  thus  leading  his  pupils 
along  the  path  of  knowledge  which  he  himself  had  trodden. 
Some,  perhaps  a  considerable  number,  of  those  who  taught  were 
competent  to  give  instruction  in  the  classics.  A  well-known 
teacher  of  the  early  days,  Thomas  Patterson,  of  Irish  birth, 
taught  the  classics  in  Plymouth  Academy,  and  is  said  to  have 
urged  upon  his  pupils  the  advantages  of  a  college  education. ^ 
The  elementary  schools  in  their  less  ambitious  forms,  in  the  more 
thinly  populated  districts  were  probably  no  better  than  those 
of  corresponding  grade  in  Connecticut.  Moreover  in  some 
settlements  schools  were  not  immediately  established.  As 
new  townships  were  laid  out  in  the  latter  years  of  the  eighteenth 
century,  in  the  midst  of  the  hardships,  uncertainties  and  dangers 
of  the  pioneer  surroundings,  there  was  little  time  for  organized 
educational  effort.  The  compulsory  educational  provision  of 
Connecticut  was  by  no  means  enforced  or  possible  of  enforce- 
ment. Many  men  and  women  grew  up  with  only  the  most 
meager  opportunities.  It  is  to  be  borne  in  mind,  however, 
that  the  Wyoming  settlers  had  never  been  an  isolated  group. 
They  were  in  constant  and  sympathetic  association  with  the 
home  state.  New  settlers  were  constantly  arriving  in  the  dis- 
*  Wyoming  Historical  Record,  Vol.  X,  p.  161. 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  55 

puted  territory.  These  naturally  brought  with  them  the  unim- 
paired and  advancing  standards  of  Connecticut.  Evidence  of 
this  contact  and  influence  has  been  shown  in  the  text-books 
used,  which  were  those  of  recent  origin  or  general  use  at  the  time 
in  New  England.  Henry  Barnard  taught  for  a  time  after  his 
graduation  from  Yale  in  Wellsboro,  in  the  present  Tioga  County, 
a  close  neighbor  of  the  New  England  section.  He  is  said  to  have 
remarked  that  the  intellectual  atmosphere  and  educational  stir 
recalled  to  him  the  similar  aspect  of  a  New  England  town.^ 
Again  it  must  not  be  forgotten  that  in  New  England  the  home 
was  emphasized  as  the  natural  place  for  the  earliest  training  and 
instruction  of  the  child  in  knowledge  of  secular,  as  well  as  of 
moral  and  religious  import.  Children  were  not  neglected  in 
Wyoming  even  where  schools  were  not  immediately  established. 
The  school  discipline  of  New  England,  effected  by  the  rod, 
was  practiced  in  Wyoming,  as  it  was  generally  at  that  time. 
Several  writers  refer  to  its  use,  but  this  depended  there  as  else- 
where largely  on  the  native  temper  or  conviction  of  the  teacher. 
Only  thoughtful  or  exceedingly  gentle  schoolmasters  at  that 
period  refrained  from  that  mode  of  attack  upon  the  evil  believed 
to  be  deeply  rooted  in  the  mind  and  heart  of  the  child. 

Another  custom  imported  from  New  England  which  made  for 
the  general  intellectual  advancement  of  the  community,  adults 
as  well  as  children,  was  the  "spelling-school,"  to  which  reference 
is  made  in  Wyoming  reminiscences.  One  teacher  is  said  to  have 
conducted  a  spelling-school  at  his  residence  on  three  evenings 
in  the  week.^  This  furnished  not  only  actual  instruction  in  a 
school  art  which  was  everywhere  at  that  time  in  a  rather  pre- 
carious condition,  but  it  also  sharpened  the  school  wits  of  those 
who  attended  and  provided  beside  opportunity  for  social  inter- 
course. ''Singing  schools"  are  also  referred  to  in  the  accounts 
of  some  districts. 

The  Sunday  School,  which  in  its  origin  in  England  and  in  our 
own  state  was  closely  related  to  secular  instruction,  appeared 
in  the  Wyoming  region  in  its  later,  and  as  we  view  it  today,  its 
legitimate  function,  namely  as  an  institution  whose  object  is  to 

*U.  S.  Bureau  of   Education,  Report  of  Commissioner,  1896-97,  Vol.  I, 

p.  772. 

'  Wyoming  Historical  Record,  Vol.  IV,  p.  4. 


56  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

care  for  the  religious  training  of  the  child.  As  such  it  is  not 
directly  related  to  the  subject  of  this  discussion.  Since  the 
aims  of  these  people  in  education  from  the  beginning  embodied 
the  non-sectarian  idea,  the  separate  administration  and  support 
of  church  and  school  followed .  Sunday  Schools  arose  in  Wyoming, 
and  it  is  of  interest  to  note  that  according  to  a  county  historian, 
previous  to  their  organization,  children  were  met  by  the  office 
bearers  in  the  church  more  or  less  frequently  and  instructed  in  the 
catechism  and  in  religious  truth. ^ 

The  absence  of  any  public  educational  organization  in  Penn- 
sylvania at  the  time  of  the  Revolution  has  been  noted.  The 
Constitution  established  by  the  General  Convention  at  Philadel- 
phia in  1776  contained  the  following  provision:  "A  school  or 
schools  shall  be  established  in  each  county  by  the  Legislature 
for  the  convenient  instruction  of  youth,  with  such  salaries  to 
the  masters  paid  by  the  public  as  may  enable  them  to  instruct 
youth  at  low  prices.  And  all  useful  learning  shall  be  duly  en- 
couraged and  promoted  in  one  or  more  universities.  "^  In  the 
Constitutional  Convention  of  1789-90,  the  committee  reporting 
a  draft  of  a  proposed  constitution  submitted  on  December  21, 
1789  the  following:  "Article  VIII,  Section  I.  A  school  or 
schools  shall  be  established  in  each  county  for  the  instruction 
of  youth,  and  the  State  shall  pay  to  the  masters  such  salaries  as 
shall  enable  them  to  teach  at  low  prices. 

"II.  The  arts,  sciences,  and  all  useful  learning  shall  be  pro- 
moted in  one  or  more  universities. 

"III.  Religious  societies  and  corporate  bodies  shall  be  pro- 
tected in  their  rights,  immunities  and  estates."^ 

On  January  30,  1790,  the  first  section  of  the  eighth  article 
being  under  consideration,  it  was  moved  by  Mr.  McKean, 
seconded  by  Mr.  Findley,  to  add  the  following  words  to  the  said 
section:  "And  the  poor  gratis."  A  motion  was  then  made  by 
Mr.  Pickering,  seconded  by  Mr.  Sitgreaves,  to  postpone  the 
consideration  of  the  said  first  section  with  the  amendment  pro- 
posed in  order  to  introduce  the  following  in  lieu  of  the  first  and 
second  section  of  the  eighth    article:     "Knowledge  generally 

*  History  of  Luzerne,  Lackawanna  and  Wyoming  Counties,  pp.  227,  228. 
2  Minutes  of  the  Convention  of  1789-90,  p.  21. 
'  Ibid.,  p.  44. 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  57 

diffused  among  the  people  being  essential  to  the  preservation 
of  their  rights,  it  shall  be  the  duty  of  the  Legislature  to  provide 
for  the  instruction  of  children  and  youth,  by  the  establishment  of 
such  schools  in  the  several  counties  throughout  the  common- 
wealth. And  the  arts,  sciences  and  all  useful  learning  shall  be 
further  promoted  in  one  or  more  universities."  The  question 
on  postponement  was  determined  in  the  negative,  as  was  also 
the  previous  motion  of  Mr.  McKean  to  amend. ^  On  February 
25,  the  eighth  article  being  under  consideration,  it  was  moved  by 
Mr.  Hubley,  seconded  by  Mr.  Wilson  to  insert  the  following 
as  the  seventh  article  of  the  Constitution : 

"Section  I.  A  school  or  schools  shall  be  established  in  each 
county  for  the  instruction  of  youth,  and  the  state  shall  pay  to 
the  masters  such  salaries  as  shall  enable  them  to  teach  at  low 
prices. 

"Section  II.  The  arts  and  sciences  shall  be  promoted  in  one 
or  more  seminaries  of  learning. 

"Section  III.  Religious  societies  and  corporate  bodies  shall  be 
protected  in  their  rights,  privileges,  immunities  and  estates."^ 

The  following  day  this  motion  recurring,  it  was  moved  by 
Mr.  McKean  and  seconded  by  Mr.  Findley  to  insert  at  the  end 
of  the  first  section,  "And  the  poor  gratis."  It  was  then  moved 
by  Mr.  Pickering  and  seconded  by  Mr.  Edwards  to  postpone 
consideration  of  the  amendment  in  order  to  introduce  the  follow- 
ing: "The  Le'gislature  shall  provide  by  law  for  the  estabHsh- 
ment  of  schools  throughout  the  state  in  such  manner  that  the 
poor  may  be  taught  gratis. "  The  question  on  postponement  be- 
ing decided  in  the  affirmative,  a  motion  was  made  by  Mr.  Mc- 
Lene  seconded  by  Mr.  Lincoln  to  insert  after  "Legislature" 
the  following:  "As  soon  as  conveniently  may  be."  This  was 
agreed  to;  the  section  as  amended  was  adopted,  and  it  was 
ordered  that  the  three  sections  as  agreed  to  be  inserted  as  the 
seventh  article  of  the  proposed  Constitution.^  The  article  as 
ultimately  adopted  and  approved  in  the  Convention  on  Septem- 
ber 2,  1790,  was  as  follows: 

"Section  I.  The  legislature  shall,  as  soon  as  conveniently  may 

1  Minutes  of  the  Grand  Committee  of  the  Whole  Convention,  pp.  75,  76. 
'  Minutes  of  the  Convention,  p.  140. 
'  Ibid.,  p.  144. 


58  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

be,  provide,  by  law,  for  the  establishment  of  schools  throughout 
the  state  in  such  manner  that  the  poor  may  be  taught  gratis. 

"Section  II.  The  arts  and  sciences  shall  be  promoted  in  one  or 
more  seminaries  of  learning. 

"Section  III.  The  rights,  privileges,  immunities  and  estates 
of  religious  societies  and  corporate  bodies  shall  remain,  as  if  the 
constitution  of  this  state  had  not  been  altered  or  amended." 

Timothy  Pickering  was  a  delegate  to  the  Convention  from  the 
newly-established  Luzerne  County.  He  was  a  native  of  Mass- 
achusetts, where  common  schools  had  long  been  accepted  as  part 
of  the  existing  order.  He  was  an  ardent  lover  of  liberty  and 
thoroughly  democratic  in  his  convictions.  Education  was  no 
incidental  concern  in  his  life;  he  had  already  demonstrated  his 
active  and  vital  interest  in  the  educational  needs  of  the  young.^ 
The  common  school  was  a  well-established  idea  in  Luzerne 
County,  where  he  was  now  a  property  owner  and  resident.  His 
special  interest  in  the  Convention  was  the  desire  to  insert  in  the 
Constitution  a  provision  which  should  secure  the  opportunity  for 
education  to  all  the  people.^  It  may  well  be  believed  that  Mr. 
Pickering  and  his  colleagues  supposed  that  they  were  laying  the 
foundations  of  a  system  of  free  common  schools,^  but  the  public 
opinion  of  the  state  was  not  yet  ready  to  accept  this  idea.  For 
years  following  the  adoption  of  the  Constitution,  charitable 
enterprise  and  legislation  endeavored  to  secure  to  those  unable 
to  pay  for  it  the  educational  advantages  provided  for  in  that 
document.^  The  subject  of  public  education  formed  the  theme 
of  many  gubernatorial  messages.  The  Act  of  1809^  requiring 
parents  unable  to  pay  for  the  education  of  their  children  to 
make  public  acknowledgment  of  their  poverty  and  to  send 
them  to  school  branded  as  paupers  was  generally  admitted  to 
be  a  dead  letter,  and  to  have  failed  of  its  purpose.  In  the  Wy- 
oming region  it  is  probable  that  the  "poor  schools"  common  in 

*  Pickering  and  Upham:   Life  of  Timothy  Pickering,  Vol.  II,  pp.  165-168, 

531.  532. 

2  Ibid.,  Vol.  II,  p.  433. 

'  Wickersham:  Op.  cit.,  p.  259.  Cf.  the  citation  from  Governor  Wolf's 
message  of  December,  1834,  below. 

*Laws  of  Pennsylvania,  1802,  March  i;  P.  L.  76.  1804,  March  19; 
P.  L.,  298. 

"  Smith's  Laws,  Vol.  V,  p.  73. 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  59 

the  older  communities  where  social  distinctions  had  become 
significant,  if  indeed  they  were  not  so  from  the  beginning,  were 
never  in  vogue.  The  law  everywhere  unpopular  with  those  for 
whose  benefit  it  was  enacted,  was  most  of  all  so  in  this  demo- 
cratic community.^  The  Wyoming  Herald  of  November  23, 
1 82 1,  quotes  from  the  National  Intelligencer  an  article  entitled 
"Yankee  Notions."  "A  Massachusetts  paper  observes  'there 
is  not  a  native  that  can  not  read  and  write ;  every  child  is  educat- 
ed ;  every  child  is  entitled  to  education  as  a  right.  The  rich  tax 
themselves  to  educate  the  poor.  By  her  constitution  and  laws 
schools  must  be  everywhere  supported,  enough  to  educate  her 
whole  population.'  We  wish  such  notions  as  these  were  pre- 
valent in  other  states."  The  Wyoming  Republican  of  Novem- 
ber 26,  (after  the  passage  of  the  law  of  1834)  said:  "The  Act  of 
April  4,  1809,  does  not  provide  for  the  establishment  of  schools  at 
all.  A  man  must  go  before  the  assessor  and  prove  himself  a 
pauper,  and  should  this  be  questioned,  again  he  must  present 
himself  before  the  County  Commissioner  to  prove  the  truth  of 
his  former  statement.  Then  his  child  might  go  to  school,  to 
be  known  as  a  poor  child,  schooled  at  the  public  expense  and 
pointed  at  as  such  by  his  schoolmates  ....  Such  humiliation 
of  God's  creatures  was  never  contemplated  by  the  framers  of 
the  Constitution."  The  "common  schools"  established  by  the 
early  settlers  continued  to  be  the  general  practice  of  this  region 
until  1834,  when  the  state  law  establishing  a  system  of  free 
public  schools  was  enacted  and  adopted  by  the  people  of  these 
counties.^  In  the  meantime  further  attempts  at  legislation 
had  been  made  by  the  Assembly  in  1824^  (this  law  was  repealed 
in  two  years^)  and  in  1831  when  a  Common  School  Fund  was 
established.^     These  successive  enactments  prepared  the  way 

1  Note:  For  ten  years  after  1824,  only  about  three  thousand  five  hundred 
dollars  were  paid  by  Luzerne  County  for  the  education  of  the  poor.  Pearce: 
Annals  of  Luzerne  County,  p.  26.  In  Wayne  County  in  1810  the  assessors 
returned  twenty-seven  poor  children,  in  181 1  twenty-nine,  in  1834  two  hundred 
and  thirty-five.  It  is  not  known  how  thoroughly  the  law  was  executed. 
The  entire  amount  spent  in  the  county  during  the  operation  of  the  law  was 
apparently  ten  thousand  dollars.     State  Report,  1877,  p.  587. 

2  U.  S.  Bureau  of  Education,  Report  of  Commissioner,  1893-94,  Vol.  I, 
p.  668. 

3  1824,  March  29;  P.  L.,  137. 

*  1826,  February  20;  P.  L.,  52. 
61831,  April  2;  P.  L.,  385. 


6o  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

for  the  last  stages  of  the  conflict  which  resulted  in  the  passage 
in  1834,  of  a  law  establishing  "a  general  system  of  education  by 
Common  Schools."  "No  other  subject,"  says  Wickersham, 
"was  ever  debated  with  so  much  heat  and  bitterness. "^  New 
England  energy  and  leadership  did  good  service  at  this  time  in 
the  cause  of  education.  Samuel  Breck,  a  native  of  Massachu- 
setts and  a  resident  of  Philadelphia,  had  accepted  a  seat  in  the 
Senate  for  the  purpose  of  securing  the  passage  of  a  law  establish- 
ing a  system  of  common  schools.  He  was  Chairman  of  a  Joint 
Committee  of  the  two  Houses  to  prepare  a  law  to  this  end. 
Contemporary  newspaper  comments  show  how  bitter  was  the 
struggle.  Poulson's  Daily  Advertiser  of  November  24,  1834,  in 
reporting  the  result  of  the  election  in  the  various  townships, 
said:  " It  is  now  ascertained  that  the  friends  of  free  schools  have 
triumphed  over  the  combined  efforts  of  selfishness,  ignorance 
and  demagogism  in  this  Commonwealth.  The  triumph  is  a 
signal  one  and  more  glorious  than  all  the  party  triumphs  in  this 
State  since  the  adoption  of  the  Constitution."  The  Luzerne 
County  papers  fought  valiantly  for  common  schools.  The 
Republican  Farmer  and  Democratic  Journal  of  Wilkes-Barre  on 
September  18,  1833,  contained  an  article  by  a  correspondent 
signing  himself  "A  Citizen  of  Luzerne."  Referring  at  some 
length  to  recently  suggested  school  plans,  he  concludes:  "I 
am  still  unchanged  in  my  opinion,  that  a  very  important  im- 
provement can  be  made  in  our  Common  Schools,  and  I  hope 
soon  to  have  the  pleasure  of  hearing  that  Luzerne  County  has 
arisen  in  her  strength  to  devise  some  general  system  to  carry  it 
all  over  the  country,  and  be  hailed  with  delight  by  every  lover  of 
education."  The  Wyoming  Republican  (called  after  January, 
1835,  The  Republican  and  Herald)  during  1834,  1835  and  1836, 
the  years  of  conflict,  repeatedly  in  its  columns  drove  home  the 
doctrine  of  free  schools  for  rich  and  poor  alike, — the  common 
school.  On  January  29,  1834,  a  Connecticut  paper  was  quoted, 
referring  to  a  statement  in  the  recent  message  of  Governor 
Wolf  as  to  the  number  of  uninstructed  children  in  the  State, 
"Who  in  New  England  would  have  believed  that  in  the  old, 
rich  and  prosperous  state  of  Pennsylvania  nearly  one  hundred 
thousand  more  children  than  there  are  in  the  State  of  Connecticut 
1  Op.  cit.,  p.  318. 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  6i 

are  entirely  uninstructed  and  growing  up  in  ignorance,  and  that 
the  state  never  appropriated  a  dollar  for  the  intellectual  improve- 
ment of  its  youth?"  On  July  i6,  1834,  the  same  paper  said  of 
the  School  Law :  "One  of  the  most  important  laws  enacted  in  this 
State  is  the  one  providing  for  a  general  system  of  education, 
by  common  schools.  In  this  law  every  citizen  of  the  State  is 
interested."  The  Wyoming  Republican  of  October  29,  1834, 
said  "At  the  recent  election  in  many  sections  of  this  State  the 
School  Bill  was  made  a  political  question.  We  were  humiliated 
to  mark  some  tickets  headed  'No  School.'  This  political  watch- 
word indicates  a  spirit  which  we  blush  to  find  within  our  bor- 
ders."  Similar  quotations  from  Luzerne  County  journals 
could  be  multiplied;  but  a  sufficient  number  has  already  been 
included  to  demonstrate  the  undoubted  attitude  of  that  section 
to  the  new  educational  enactment  of  the  State. 

Under  the  provisions  of  the  law  of  1834  the  school  districts 
in  each  county  were  to  elect  directors,  and  subsequently  a  dele- 
gate from  each  school  district  was  to  attend  with  the  county 
commissioners  a  meeting  to  decide  whether  the  tax  should  be 
levied  for  the  support  of  schools.  Districts  voting  against  the 
county  tax  were  to  receive  nothing  from  the  state,  such  dis- 
tricts being  allowed  to  educate  their  poor  under  the  Act  of  1809.^ 

The  results  of  the  election  showed  that  in  the  western,  north- 
ern and  some  of  the  middle  counties  there  was  no  opposition. 
In  the  middle  counties  the  opposition  was  most  formidable,  but 
even  in  these  a  portion  of  the  townships  accepted  the  law,  with  the 
exceptionof  Lebanon,  in  which  opposition  Directors  were  elected 
in  every  township.^  In  the  New  England  counties  a  heavy  vote 
was  cast  in  favor  of  the  new  system.  In  Luzerne  County, 
consisting  of  thirty-one  districts,  twenty-three  accepted  the  law, 
three  rejected  it,  and  five  were  not  represented.  In  Susquehanna, 
consisting  of  twenty-two  districts,  twenty-one  accepted,  one 
made  no  return.  In  Wayne,  having  sixteen  districts,  thirteen 
accepted,  one  rejected,  one  was  not  represented,  and  one  made  no 
return.  In  Pike,  with  nine  districts,  six  accepted,  three  were 
not  represented.  In  Bradford,  with  twenty-nine  districts, 
twenty- three  accepted,  four  were  not  represented,  and  two  made 

^  1834,  April  i;  P.  L.,  170. 

'  Wyoming  Republican,  October  15,  1834. 


62  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

no  return.  In  Potter,  of  fifteen  districts,  eleven  accepted,  four 
were  not  represented.  In  the  six  counties,  therefore,  represent- 
ing at  that  time  the  bulk  of  the  New  England  population  (Lack- 
awanna and  Wyoming  had  not  been  erected  in  1834)  of  one 
hundred  and  twenty- two  districts,  ninety-seven,  or  more  than 
seventy-nine  per  cent,  accepted  the  law.  A  comparison  of 
these  figures  with  the  returns  made  by  the  counties  in  the  older 
portion  of  the  state,  Chester,  Delaware,  Berks,  Bucks,  Lancaster 
and  Montgomery,  is  interesting.  (Philadelphia  had  already 
been  provided  for  by  the  Act  of  1818.^)  Of  one  hundred  and 
ninety-one  districts  in  these  counties  only  sixty,  or  something 
more  than  thirty-one  per  cent,  accepted  the  law,  while  of  the  one 
hundred  and  thirty-one  remaining,  eighty-nine  rejected  it,  and 
forty- two  were  not  represented,  or  made  no  return. ^  In  Wilkes- 
Barre,  when  the  directors  assembled  in  the  November  following 
the  election,  as  instructed  by  Act  of  Assembly,  they  resolved 
to  levy  a  school  tax  equal  to  double  the  sum  appropriated  by 
the  state  for  school  purposes.^ 

In  his  message  to  the  Legislature  at  the  opening  of  the  session 
of  1834-35  Governor  Wolf  in  commenting  upon  the  passage  of 
the  law  during  the  previous  session  made  the  following  significant 
statement:  "At  the  last  session  of  the  Legislature  an  act  was 
passed  for  establishing  a  general  system  of  education  by  com- 
mon schools  throughout  the  Commonwealth,  in  compliance  with 
a  constitutional  provision  which  until  then,  although  not  en- 
tirely disregarded,  had  never  been  carried  into  effect  in  the  man- 
ner intended  by  the  members  of  the  convention  to  whose  sagacity 
and  profound  political  wisdom  we  are  indebted  for  the  present 
excellent  Constitution  of  our  state  .  .  :  .  This  may  be  emphati- 
cally pronounced  to  be  a  measure  belonging  to  the  era  of  seven- 
teen hundred  and  ninety,  and  not  to  that  of  eighteen  hundred 
and  thirty-four.  To  insist  that  it  emanated  either  from  the 
Executive  or  the  Legislature,  however  desirable  it  might  be 
to  appropriate  the  proud  distinction  of  being  its  progenitor, 
is  an  entire  fallacy.  Such  a  monument  of  imperishable  fame 
was  not  reserved  for  the  men  of  modern  times, — it  belongs  to 

1 1818;  March  3;  P.  L.,  124. 

2  Wickersham:  Op.  cit.,  p.  322. 

^Wyoming  Republican,  November  12,  1834. 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  63 

the  statesmen  of  by-gone  days.  To  the  patriots  who  formed 
the  constitution  under  which  we  live  and  under  which  we  have 
been  pre-eminently  prosperous  and  happy  belongs  the  proud 
trophy,  it  is  to  them  we  are  indebted  for  this  wholesome  meas- 
ure, "i 

The  struggle  was  not  ended,  however,  by  the  law  of  1834. 
The  law  did  not  represent  the  public  opinion  of  the  state.  The 
question  was  agitated  the  next  year  in  the  state  and  in  the  Legis- 
lature. The  repeal  of  the  law  was  proposed  and  the  re-enact- 
ment of  that  of  1809.  Numerous  petitions  for  repeal  or  modifi- 
cation of  the  law  were  sent  to  the  Legislature,  and  others  were 
sent  remonstrating  against  the  repeal.^  Mr.  Almon  H.  Read 
represented  in  the  Senate  the  eleventh  district,  composed  of 
Bradford,  Susquehanna  and  Tioga  counties,  and  he  strove  to 
preserve  the  common  school  system  for  his  own  district  and  for 
Luzerne.  The  New  England  section  was  resolved  to  retain  the 
school  law.  The  Harrisburg  correspondent  of  Poulson's  Daily 
Advertiser  of  March  20,  1835,  wrote:  "The  Senate  agreed  on 
second  reading  to  repeal  the  school  law  of  last  session ;  a  stren- 
uous exertion  was  made  by  Mr.  Read  of  Susquehanna  to  have 
the  counties  of  Luzerne,  Susquehanna,  Bradford  and  Tioga 
exempted  from  the  repeal,  but  a  majority  of  our  enlightened 
Senators  were  determined  that  the  constituencies  of  other 
Senators  should  not  enjoy  the  advantage  of  what  they  termed 
an  aristocratic  law,  though  they  earnestly  desired  it.  Our 
Jack  Cades  seemed  determined  to  destroy  every  vestige  of  a 
general  and  enlightened  system  of  education. "  The  same  writer 
had  asserted  that  one-fourth  of  the  adult  population  of  Penn- 
sylvania were  unable  to  write  their  names.  "By  way  of  con- 
trast," said  the  Wyoming  Republican  and  Herald,  "how  does 
this  matter  stand  in  Connecticut?  Chief  Justice  Reeves  of 
that  state  says  that  during  twenty-seven  years  of  professional 
practice  every  one  of  his  clients  could  write  his  name.  "^  Once 
more  Pennsylvania  was  indebted  for  educational  leadership  to 
New  England,  and  this  time  the  forces  on  the  side  of  the  common 
school   were    marshalled    by   Thaddeus   Stevens.     A   law   was 

*  Journal  of  the  Senate  of  Pennsylvania,  1834-35,  pp.  18-20. 

2  Journals  of  the  Senate  and  House  of  Representatives  for  1834-35. 

3  Wyoming  Republican  and  Herald,  April  15,  1835. 


64  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

finally  enacted,  and  approved  April  15,  1835,  which  established 
permanently  the  free  common  school  in  the  state.^  The  law 
of  1836,  "An  Act  to  consolidate  and  amend  the  several  acts 
relative  to  a  general  system  of  education  by  common  schools," 
finally  shaped  the  educational  policy  of  the  state.^ 

The  long-established  practice  of  the  Wyoming  district  merged 
easily  into  the  new  system,  the  financial  basis  having  already 
been  laid.  At  a  meeting  of  School  Delegates  from  different 
townships  of  the  County  of  Luzerne,  held  on  May  27,  1835,  it 
was  resolved  that  a  tax  be  authorized  in  the  county  of  three 
thousand  dollars,  and  if  that  sum  should  be  found  insufficient 
to  entitle  the  county  to  the  State  appropriation,  such  a  sum 
should  be  levied  as  would  be  double  the  amount  of  such  ap- 
propriation by  the  State.  It  was  also  resolved  that  a  form  of 
Certificate  be  used  in  the  different  districts  of  the  county: 
"The  Undersigned  School  Directors  of Dis- 
trict hereby  certify  that  we  have  examined    

and  find to  be  of  good  moral  character  and  qualified  to 

teach  Reading,  Writing,  Arithmetic, "^ 

By  the  law  of  1831  the  state  had  begun  the  creation  of  a  fund  for 
the  support  of  schools.  School  funds  had  long  been  established 
in  Wyoming  by  the  lease  or  sale  of  the  lands  set  apart  by  the 
Susquehanna  Company  in  the  various  townships.  These  were 
known  as  the  "Proprietors'  Funds."  In  consequence  of  the 
early  lease  or  sale  of  these  tracts  only  small  sums  had  been 
realized  in  many  cases  from  lands  which  at  this  date  would  have 
yielded  large  amounts.  Under  the  Act  of  1799  certificates  had 
been  issued  by  the  Commissioners  to  the  School  Committees  for 
the  time  being  for  such  lots  as  remained  in  trust  for  the  use  of 
the  proprietors  of  the  townships.  As  these  Committees  had 
from  time  to  time  sold  or  let  upon  leases  for  a  long  term  of  years 
large  parts  of  the  lots,  reserving  the  rents  for  the  use  of  the  pro- 
prietors, and  since  they  were  not  vested  with  the  legal  titles, 
these  sales  and  leases  were  not  valid.  Moreover,  rents  and  dues 
had  increased  but  they  could  not  be  recovered  without  legal 
authority.     The  legislature  therefore  passed  an  Act  on  April  2, 

1 1835,  April  15;  P.  L.,  365. 
21836,  June  13;  P.  L.,  525. 
'  Wyoming  Republican  and  Herald,  June  24,  1835. 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  65 

1 83 1,  incorporating  the  trustees  of  the  township  and  borough 
of  Wilkes-Barre,  those  of  the  township  of  Plymouth  and  of 
Hanover,  and  providing  for  the  election  in  each  township  of 
three  persons  to  be  called  "proprietors,"  to  constitute  a  body 
corporate  and  politic.^  On  April  14,  1835,  a  supplement  to 
the  above  Act  was  approved,  extending  its  provisions  to  the 
township  and  proprietors  of  Providence.^  "Had  the  govern- 
ment of  Pennsylvania  made  similar  provision  for  each  township 
in  the  Commonwealth,"  says  a  Wyoming  writer  in  1830,  "its 
advantages,  judging  from  all  experience,  and  particularly  from 
the  Connecticut  system  of  Common  School  support  from  which 
the  original  settlers  in  Kingston  took  the  hint,  would  have  been 
invaluable.  The  day  is  past  for  this  species  of  provision;  but 
it  is  believed  if  Pennsylvania  prosecutes  and  completes  her 
system  of  internal  improvement,  the  time  is  not  far  distant 
when  its  income  will  be  abundantly  sufficient  to  extinguish  the 
debt  incurred,  and  make  ample  provision  for  the  Common 
School  education  of  every  child  in  this  Commonwealth."^ 
These  words  embodied  a  prophecy  and  a  hope  which  were  des- 
tined to  a  speedy  fulfilment,  when  a  few  years  later  the  great 
State  made  up  of  the  descendants  of  so  many  peoples  delivered 
to  her  children  the  charter  of  their  democracy  in  education, 
and  sealed  to  the  childhood  of  the  Commonwealth  forever  the 
inestimable  privileges  of  the  common  school. 

1 1831,  April  2;  P.  L.,  367. 

2  1835,  April  14;  P.  L.,  274. 

'  Chapman:  Op.  cit.,  Appendix,  pp.  i66,  189. 


APPENDIX 

A.  In  volume XIII,  p.  iii,  of  the  Proceedings  and  Collections 
of  the  Wyoming  Historical  and  Geological  Society  Mr.  Harvey 
writes:  "Colonel  Pickering,  writing  to  his  brother  in  November, 
1787,  with  respect  to  certain  disturbances  in  Wyoming  said :  'The 
principal  conspirators  (in  a  plan  to  erect  a  new  state  in  the 
Wyoming  region  and  adjacent  country  of  New  York)  lived  in 
the  States  of  Connecticut  and  New  York.  Their  plot  was  so  far 
advanced  that  Major  (William)  Judd,  a  Connecticut  lawyer,  had 
actually  drawn  up  a  Constitution  for  their  intended  new  State, 
which  was  to  be  called  Westmoreland,  the  name  of  the  Wyoming 
district    when    a    county    under    Connecticut    jurisdiction.'  " 

B.  The  Susquehanna  Democrat  for  December  4,  18 12,  con- 
tained the  following  announcement:  "The  Trustees  and  Man- 
agers of  the  Wilkes-Barre  Academy  inform  the  public  that  the 
Superintendence  of  that  institution  is  now  intrusted  to  Mr. 
Jennison  under  a  permanent  engagement  for  the  term  of  three 
years  at  least.  Scholars  are  instructed  in  all  or  any  of  the  fol- 
lowing branches :  viz.,  Spelling,  Reading,  Penmanship,  Book-keep- 
ing, Arithmetic,  English  Grammar,  in  its  various  parts,  Geography 
and  the  use  of  the  Globes,  History,  Composition,  the  Latin  and 
Greek  languages  in  all  their  respective  classical  authors,  Rhetorick, 
Logic,  Mathematicks  in  all  the  different  branches,  including 
Natural  Philosophy  and  Astronomy;  and  generally  all  the 
branches  of  Science  which  are  taught  in  any  of  the  Academies 
of  our  country.  The  studies  of  scholars,  if  requested,  will 
be  so  calculated  as  to  prepare  them  for  admission  into  any 
college  which  may  be  desired,  or  the  pupils  by  a  longer  contin- 
uance at  the  Academy  may  obtain  the  substance  of  a  complete 
scientific  education. " 

C.  The  Susquehanna  Democrat  for  May  7,  18 13,  contained 
the  following:  Mr.  and  Miss  Woodbridge  from  Philadelphia 
announce  that  a  Boarding  and  Day  School  is  opened  in  Wilkes- 
Barre  for  the  instruction  of  Young  Ladies  in  the  following 
branches  of  Education:  Writing,  Grammar,  Letter- Writing  and 

66 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  67 

Composition,  Arithmetic,  with  its  ready  application  to  bills 
and  accounts,  Geography  with  the  use  of  the  Globes  and  Maps. 
A  general  course  of  useful  Science  and  Polite  Literature,  includ- 
ing Chronology  and  History,  domestic,  ancient  and  modern, 
Rhetoric  and  Poetry,  the  Elements  of  Natural  Philosophy, 
Astronomy,  Natural  History,  Chemistry,  Moral  Philosophy, 
explaining  the  powers,  operations  and  improvements  of  the 
mind,  the  relations,  virtues  and  duties  of  humanity.  "The 
proper  study  of  Mankind  is  Man." 

The  whole  will  be  reviewed,  exemplified  and  explained  by  a 
course  of  Lectures,  calculated  to  render  the  progress  of  the  Scho- 
lars and  the  review  of  Studies  entertaining  and  useful  ....  A 
Committee  of  monthly  visitation  of  the  School  and  general 
observation  of  the  manners  and  morals  of  the  Scholars  will  be 
appointed  from  the  Parents,  Guardians  and  respectable  inhabi- 
tants of  Wilkes-Barre. 

We,  the  undersigned,  certify  that  the  above  Rev.  William 
Woodbridge  has  been  employed  as  Principal  in  a  Young  Ladies* 
Academy  for  many  years  past,  that  he  has  resided  and  taught 
with  honor  to  himself  and  great  improvement  to  his  pupils, 
and  in  testimony  of  our  confidence  in  him  as  the  able  and  faith- 
ful Instructor  we  propose  to  place  our  Daughters  under  his  care 
and  tuition  in  his  Boarding  School. 

Lord  Butler 
RosEWELL  Welles 
Ebenezer  Bowman 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

I.    Histories  and  Historical  Collections  Relating  to  the 

Wyoming  Valley 

A .     Histories 

Chapman,  LA.  A  Sketch  of  the  history  of  Wyoming,  1818. 
To  which  is  added  an  Appendix  containing  a  statistical 
account  of  the  Valley  and  adjacent  country.  By  a  Gentle- 
man of  Wilkes-Barre.  Wilkes-Barre,  Pennsylvania,  1830. 
Printed  and  published  by  Sharp  D.  Lewis. 

(This  is  the  earliest  history  of  Wyoming.  In  the  Preface,  July  18,  181 8, 
the  author  states  that  he  had  the  testimony  of  living  actors  in  many  events 
described,  in  addition  to  documentary  evidence.  A  note  by  the  publisher 
in  1830  states  that  after  the  receipt  of  the  manuscript  journals  which  had  been 
kept  by  participants  in  some  of  the  scenes  recorded  came  into  his  possession, 
which  furnished  corrections  and  corroborations  of  the  former  account.) 

Miner,  C.     History  of  Wyoming  in  a  series  of  letters  from 

Charles  Miner  to  his  Son,  William  Penn  Miner,  Esq.,  of 

Philadelphia.     Philadelphia,  J.  Cressy,  1845. 

(This  history  was  derived  from  the  personal  narratives  of  numerous  eye- 
witnesses and  participants  in  the  events  carefully  compared;  also  from  public 
documents  and  records  and  private  papers.  The  author  had  access  to  a 
portion  of  the  "Westmoreland  Records."  Mr.  Harvey  says  that  this  history 
is  considered  "the  most  copious,  complete  and  authentic  work  on  the  subject. ") 

Peck,  G.     Wyoming,  its  history,  stirring  incidents  and  romantic 
adventures,  with  illustrations.     New  York,  Harper,   1858. 
(Contains  narratives  and  reminiscences  from  various  individuals.) 

Wright,  H.  B.  Historical  Sketches  of  Plymouth,  Luzerne 
County,  Pennsylvania.     Philadelphia,  T.  B.  Peterson,  1873. 

Goodrich,  P.  G.  History  of  Wayne  County,  Pennsylvania. 
Honesdale,  Penna.,  Haines  and  Beardsley,  1880. 

History    of    Luzerne,    Lackawanna    and    Wyoming    Counties, 

Pennsylvania.     With  illustrations  and  biographical  sketches 

of  some  of  their  prominent  men  and  pioneers.     New  York, 

Mansell,  1880. 

(Dr.  Horace  E.  Hayden,  secretary  of  the  Wyoming  Historical  and  Geologi- 
cal Society  has  commended  the  purely  historical  parts  of  the  work,  and  espec- 

68 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  69 

ially  the  history  of  the  towns.     See  manuscript  note  in  the  copy  in  the  Mer- 
cantile Library,  Philadelphia.) 

Harvey,  O.  J.  A  History  of  Wilkes-Barre,  Luzerne  County, 
Pennsylvania  from  its  first  beginnings  to  the  present  time, 
including  chapters  of  newly-discovered  early  Wyoming 
Valley  history,  together  with  many  biographical  sketches 
and  much  genealogical  material.  Illustrated  with  many 
portraits,  maps,  fac-similes,  original  drawings  and  con- 
temporary views.  3  V.  Wilkes-Barre,  Reeder  Press,  1909. 
(Vols.  I  and  2  have  been  issued.) 

(Mr.  Harvey's  work  is  an  exhaustive  and  scholarly  study  based  on  docu- 
ments, archives,  public  and  private  contemporary  records,  not  previously 
examined.  It  is  the  first  of  its  kind  of  the  Wyoming  region.  The  first  volume 
contains  a  description  of  the  sources  whence  the  history  has  been  drawn  (pp. 
I9~3i)'     The  second  volume  brings  the  narrative  down  to  1780.) 

B.    Historical  Collections 

Proceedings  and  Collections  of  the  Wyoming  Historical  and 
Geological  Society,  vols.  1-13.  Wilkes-Barre,  Pennsyl- 
vania. The  Wyoming  Historical  and  Geological  Society, 
1858-1914. 

The  Historical  Record  of  Wyoming  Valley ,  vols.  1-14, 1886-1908. 

(Originally)    a    monthly    publication    devoted    principally 

to  the  early  history  of  Wyoming  Valley,  with  notes  and 

queries,    biographical,    antiquarian,    genealogical.     Edited 

by  F.  C.  Johnson,  Wilkes-Barre,  Pennsylvania. 

(The  contents  of  these  volumes  originally  appeared  in  the  Daily  Record  of 
Wilkes-Barre,  of  which  the  late  Dr.  Johnson  was  editor,  as  a  weekly  column 
of  historical  data  relating  to  the  early  days  and  people  of  Wyoming.  The 
volumes  were  published  at  first  monthly,  later  quarterly,  and  afterward  at 
longer  intervals.) 

II.    Histories    of    Connecticut   and    Pennsylvania,    and 

Other  Historical  Works 

Clark,  G.  L.  A  history  of  Connecticut,  its  people  and  in- 
stitutions. With  one  hundred  illustrations  and  maps. 
New  York,  Putnam,  1914. 

Eggleston,  E.  The  Transit  of  Civilization  from  England  to 
America  in  the  seventeenth  century.  New  York,  Apple- 
ton,  1901. 


70  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

Egle,  W.  H.     History  of  the  Commonwealth  of  Pennsylvania, 

civil,  political  and  military,  from  its  earliest  settlement  to 

the  present  time,  including  historical  descriptions  of  each 

county  in  the  state,  their  towns,  and  industrial  resources. 

3d    edition   revised   and   corrected.     Philadelphia,    E.   M. 

Gardner,  1883.     (Bi-Centennial  edition.) 

(The  work  contains  a  sketch  of  the  history  of  the  state,  and    in  separate 
chapters  that  of  the  counties,  written  or  revised  by  various  writers.) 

Fisher,  S.  G.  The  Making  of  Pennsylvania.  An  analysis  of  the 
elements  of  the  population  and  the  formative  influences  of  the 
greatest  of  the  American  states.  Philadelphia,  Lippincott, 
1902. 

Fiske,  J.  The  Beginnings  of  New  England,  or  the  Puritan 
Theocracy  in  its  relation  to  the  civil  and  religious  liberty. 
Boston,  Houghton,  c.  1889. 

Fiske,  J.  The  Dutch  and  Quaker  Colonies  in  America.  2  v. 
Boston,  Houghton,  c.  1899. 

Johnston,  A.  Connecticut,  a  study  of  a  commonwealth- 
democracy.  American  Commonwealth  Series  edited  by 
H.  E.  Scudder.     Boston,  Houghton,  1890. 

(An  account  of  the  development  of  the  state  from  the  earliest  time  to  the 
Civil  War.     An  Appendix  contains  the  Constitution  of  1639.) 

Larned,  E.  D.  A  history  of  Windham  County,  Connecticut, 
2  v.  Vol.  I,  1 600-1 760.  Vol.  2,  1 760-1 880.  Worcester, 
Massachusetts,  Author,  1874. 

McM aster,  J.  B.  History  of  the  People  of  the  United  States, 
8  V.     New  York,  Appleton,  1883-19 13. 

Trumbull,  B.  A  complete  history  of  Connecticut,  civil  and 
ecclesiastical  from  the  emigration  of  its  first  planters  from 
England  in  the  year  1630  to  the  year  1764  and  to  the  close 
of  the  Indian  Wars.  2  vols.  Vol.  i  has  an  "Appendix 
containing  the  original  patent  of  New  England  never  be- 
fore published  in  America."  New  Haven,  Maltby, 
Goldsmith  and  Company  and  Samuel  Wadsworth,   181 8. 

HI.    State    Records,    Documents,    Laws,    Legal    Papers 

Charter  to  William  Penn  and  Laws  of  the  Province  of  Penn- 
sylvania passed  between  the  years  1682  and  1700.     Pre- 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  71 

ceded  by  the  Duke  of  York's  laws  in  force  from  the  year  1676 
to  the  year  1682.  With  an  appendix  containing  laws  re- 
lating to  the  organization  of  the  provincial  courts  and 
historical  matter.  Published  under  the  direction  of  John 
Blair  Linn,  Secretary  to  the  Commonwealth.  Compiled 
and  edited  by  George  Staughton,  Benjamin  M.  Mead, 
Thomas  McCamant,  Harrisburg,  1879. 

Colonial  Records.  Minutes  of  the  Provincial  Council  of  Penn- 
sylvania from  the  organization  to  the  termination  of  the 
Proprietary  Government.  Published  by  the  State,  Harris- 
burg, 1852.     Vol.  10. 

Hoyt,  H.  M.  Brief  of  a  Title  in  the  Seventeen  Townships  in 
the  County  of  Luzerne;  a  syllabus  of  the  controversy 
between  Connecticut  and  Pennsylvania.  Harrisburg,  Mis- 
cellaneous Publications  of  the  Historical  Society  of  Penn- 
sylvania, Vol.  3,  1879. 

Journals  of  the  Senate  and  House  of  Representatives  of  Penn- 
sylvania, 1834-35.  Harrisburg,  Printed  by  Welsh  and 
Patterson. 

Liberty  Bell  Leaflets,  No.  3  Penn's  Frame  of  Government  of 
1682  and  Privileges  and  Concessions  of  1701.  Edited  by 
M.  G.  Brumbaugh  and  J.  S.  Walton.  Philadelphia,  Christo- 
pher Sower,  1898. 

Minutes  of  the  Convention  of  the  Commonwealth  of  Penn- 
sylvania which  commenced  at  Philadelphia  on  Tuesday  the 
twenty-fourth  day  of  November  in  the  year  of  our  Lord 
one  thousand  seven  hundred  and  eighty-nine  for  the  purpose 
of  reviewing  and  if  they  see  occasion  altering  and  amending 
the  Constitution  of  the  State.  Philadelphia,  Zachariah 
Poulson,  1789. 

Minutes  of  the  Grand  Committee  of  the  Whole  Convention  of 
the  Commonwealth  of  Pennsylvania  which  commenced  at 
Philadelphia  on  the  twenty-fourth  day  of  November  in  the 
year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  seven  hundred  and  eighty- 
nine  for  the  purpose  of  reviewing  and  if  they  see  occasion 
altering  and  amending  the  Constitution  of  this  State. 
Philadelphia,  Zachariah  Poulson,  1790. 

Pennsylvania  Archives,  Second  Series,  Vol.  18.  (Including  the 
records  of  the  Susquehanna  Company  also  "An  Examination 


^2  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut  to  the 

of  the  Connecticut  Claim  to  Lands  in  Pennsylvania,"  1774. 

Attributed  to  Rev.  William  Smith,  D.  D.,  pp.  125-214.) 

Smith's   Laws   of   Pennsylvania,   Vol.    Ill,    V.   and    Pamphlet 

Laws,  1801-3,  1803-4,  1810-12,  1823-24,  1825-26,  1830-31, 

1834-35,  1835-36. 
Statutes  at  Large  of  Pennsylvania  from  1682  to  1801.     Compiled 
under  the  authority  of  the  act  of  May  19,  1887,  by  James  F. 
Mitchell    and    Henry    Flanders,    Commissioners.     C.    M. 
Busch,  State  printer,  1896.     Vols.  2,  3,  4. 

IV.    Educational  History 
A .    General  and  Special  Histories  and  Studies. 

Boone,  R.  G.  Education  in  the  United  States.  Its  history 
from  the  earliest  settlements.     New  York,  Appleton,  1890. 

Brown,  E.  E.  The  Making  of  our  Middle  Schools.  An 
account  of  the  development  of  secondary  education  in  the 
United  States.     3d  edition,  New  York,  Longmans,   1910. 

Clews,  E.  W.  Educational  legislation  and  administration  of  the 
colonial  governments.  New  York,  Columbia  University, 
1899. 

Dexter,  E.  G.  A  History  of  Education  in  the  United  States. 
New  York,  Macmillan,  1904. 

Graves,  F.  P.  A  History  of  Education  in  Modern  Times. 
New  York,  Macmillan,  1914. 

KiLPATRiCK,  W.  H.  The  Dutch  Schools  of  New  Netherland 
and  Colonial  New  York.  (U.  S.  Bureau  of  Education, 
Bulletin,  1912.     No.  12,  Whole  No.  483.) 

Leach,  F.  English  Schools  at  the  Reformation,  1546-8.  West- 
minster, Arnold  Constable,  1896. 

Martin,  G.  H.  The  Evolution  of  the  Massachusetts  Public 
School  System.  A  historical  sketch.  New  York,  Apple- 
ton,  1908. 

Monroe,  P.  A  Text  Book  in  the  History  of  Education.  New 
York,  Macmillan,  1905. 

Montgomery,  T.  H.  A  History  of  the  University  of  Pennsyl- 
vania from  its  foundation  to  1770.  Philadelphia,  Jacobs, 
1900. 

Painter,  F.  V.  N.  Luther  on  Education,  including  a  trans- 
lation of  his  two  most  important  educational  treatises. 
Philadelphia,  Lutheran  Publication  Society,  1883. 


a  • 


Common  School  System  of  Pennsylvania  73 

Steiner,  B.  C.  The  History  of  Education  in  Connecticut. 
(U.  S.  Bureau  of  Education,  Circular  of  Information,  No.  2, 
1893.     Whole  No.  193.) 

Weber,  S.  E.  The  Charity  School  Movement  in  Colonial 
Pennsylvania.     Philadelphia,  G.  T.  Lasher,  1905. 

Wickersham,  J.  p.  a  History  of  Education  in  Pennsylvania, 
private  and  public,  elementary  and  higher  from  the  time  the 
Swedes  settled  on  the  Delaware  to  the  present  day.  Lan- 
caster, Pennsylvania,  Inquirer  Publishing  Company,  1886. 

B.    Educational  Reports  and  Collections 

Barnard,  H.  American  Journal  of  Education.  Vols,  i,  4,  16, 
24. 

Monroe,  P.  (Editor).  A  Cyclopaedia  of  Education.  5  vols. 
New  York,  Macmillan,  1911-1913. 

Report  of  Superintendent  of  Public  Instruction  of  the  Common- 
wealth of  Pennsylvania  for  the  year  ending  June  i,  1877. 
Harrisburg,  1878. 

United  States  Bureau  of  Education,  Report  of  Commissioner, 
i892-'93,  i893-'94,  i894-'95,  i896-'97. 

V.    Biography 

Clarkson,  T.  Memoirs  of  the  public  and  private  life  of  Wil- 
liam Penn,  with  a  preface  by  W.  E.  Forster.  New  ed. 
London,  Gilpin,  1849. 

Pickering,  Octavius,  and  Upham,  C.  W.  Life  of  Timothy 
Pickering.     4V.     Boston,  Little,  1867-73. 

VI.    Manuscripts  and  Newspapers 

Miscellaneous  Manuscripts  pertaining  to  Northampton  County, 
Pennsylvania,  1 727-1 758.  (In  the  Historical  Society  of 
Pennsylvania,  Philadelphia.) 

Volume  of  Newspaper  Clippings  of  Luzerne  County,  Pennsyl- 
vania. (In  the  Historical  Society  of  Pennsylvania,  Phila- 
delphia.) 

The  Luzerne  Federalist  and  Susquehanna  Intelligencer.  Printed 
by  Charles  Miner  at  Wilkes-Barre,   Pennsylvania,    1802. 

The  Susquehanna  Democrat.  Published  by  Samuel  Maffet 
in  Wilkes-Barre,  Luzerne  County,  Pennsylvania.  18 12, 
1813. 


74  The  Contribution  of  Connecticut 

Wyoming  Herald,  Wilkes-Barre,  Pennsylvania.     182 1. 
Republican    Farmer    and    Democratic    Journal.     Printed    and 

published  by  Benjamin  A.   Bidlack  and  John  Atherholt, 

Wilkes-Barre,  Pennsylvania.     1833. 
Wyoming   Republican,   from    1835   Wyoming   Republican   and 

Herald.     Published  every  Wednesday  morning  by  Sharp 

D.    Lewis   in    Kingston,    Luzerne    County,    Pennsylvania. 

1834,  1835,  1836. 
Poulson's  Daily  Advertiser.     Philadelphia.     1834,  1835. 


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